Anterior
- AI is dominating healthcare investments this year as VC funding picks back up after a slump.
- We asked VCs at firms like Khosla Ventures and Lux Capital to name rising startups in healthcare AI.
- They picked 22 companies using AI to improve cardiovascular care, insurance payments, and more.
This year, AI has taken over healthcare investments.
A third of all healthcare funding went to startups leveraging AI in the first half of 2024, according to Rock Health.
That number could increase as healthcare founders in need of fresh cash see the writing on the wall and build out new AI strategies.
That's why this year Business Insider's list of the most promising startups in healthcare is focusing on healthcare startups using AI to supercharge their businesses and bring better care to patients.
We asked investors at top VC firms such as Khosla Ventures, Lux Capital, and Insight Partners to name startups leveraging AI to improve healthcare.
Each VC named one startup in their portfolio and one startup they hadn't invested in.
They picked healthcare startups using AI to tackle a wide range of issues, from mental healthcare access to cardiovascular care management.
Here are their picks for the most promising healthcare AI startups of 2024.
Abridge
Startup: Abridge
Recommended by: Marisa Bass, Primary Venture Partners; Shravan Narayen, IVP; Deena Shakir, Lux Capital
Relationship: Primary and Lux have no financial interest in Abridge. IVP is an investor in Abridge.
Total funding: $212.5 million
What it does: Abridge's generative AI tech transcribes patient-doctor interactions and documents those visits in electronic health records.
Why it's on the list: Abridge raised a $150 million Series C round in February to keep developing its tech and relieve administrative burdens from clinicians as healthcare's labor crisis continues. Narayen and Bass highlighted Abridge's partnership with EHR giant Epic, which could help the startup gain more traction with hospitals this year.
"Abridge has a lot of the necessary ingredients (capital, early commercial traction, strong ecosystem partners, high caliber team) to support provider workflows, help improve communication with patients while also serving as a scaled GenAI business, that could spur additional investment in the space," Bass said.
Shakir said she's "been amazed at the progress the company has made to date," noting its partnerships with major health systems including Yale New Haven Health, UChicago Medicine, and Sutter Health — and "most importantly, doctors seem to love the product!"
AliveCor
Startup: AliveCor
Recommended by: Alex Morgan, Khosla Ventures
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $350 million, according to PitchBook
What it does: AliveCor helps people remotely manage their heart health with connected devices like personal electrocardiograms.
Why it's on the list: In June, AliveCor launched its FDA-approved AI, which can detect 35 cardiac conditions including heart attacks. That AI will be powered by its new pocket-sized ECG to measure the electrical impulses of a patient's heart.
"Because the device is compact and easy to use, this new device can be used in places that don't already have ECG machines on hand, and in particular, will accelerate decision-making around heart attacks," Morgan said.
Anterior
Recommended by: Scott Barclay, Insight Partners
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $23 million
What it does: Anterior makes AI-powered prior authorization tech for health insurers.
Why it's on the list: Anterior provides its tech to clinicians working at health insurers to help them more quickly and accurately determine how medical services are paid for. The startup counts NEA, Sequoia Capital, and head of Microsoft AI Mustafa Suleyman among its backers.
Barclay said Anterior's focus on health insurers smartly allows the startup to tackle a "valuable, immediate, and data-rich" problem in healthcare. He said Insight Partners is "excited about their road map of broad administrative applications."
"The product boosts nurse productivity and decreases case costs, particularly valuable in an environment of nurse shortages and rising admin expenditures," he said.
Bayesian Health
Startup: Bayesian Health
Recommended by: Michael Greeley, Flare Capital Partners
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $15 million
What it does: Bayesian Health delivers AI-powered clinical insights to hospitals to detect conditions like sepsis.
Why it's on the list: Bayesian Health is led by multi-hyphenate Dr. Suchi Saria — a professor and director of machine learning at the AI and healthcare lab at Johns Hopkins University, a cofounder of the Coalition for Health AI, and an angel investor, among many more titles. The startup's tech integrates with electronic health records to analyze patient data and help providers predict and prevent life-threatening conditions.
"Easily integrated into existing hospital workflows, the platform should readily extend to address other acute conditions such as pulmonary embolisms, pressure ulcers, and deep venous thrombosis," Greeley said.
Charlie Health
Startup: Charlie Health
Recommended by: Alex Morgan, Khosla Ventures
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: Not disclosed
What it does: Charlie Health provides intensive outpatient mental health services to teens and young adults online.
Why it's on the list: Charlie Health is tackling the US's worsening youth mental health crisis at a time when adolescent mental health specialists are few and far between, Morgan noted. He pointed to Charlie Health's partnership with health system Houston-based Memorial Hermann, announced earlier this year — the nonprofit Mental Health America ranked Texas last in the nation in 2023 for access to mental health services. Charlie Health has also notched deals with other startups like Talkiatry and Mantra Health.
The company told Business Insider it's using AI to match clients with therapists, groups, and evidence-based treatments by leveraging a mix of historical data, real-time analytics, and predictive insights.
Clarium
Startup: Clarium
Recommended by: Yuanling Yuan, SignalFire
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $16 million
What it does: Clarium uses AI to streamline hospital supply chains and reduce waste.
Why it's on the list: Clarium's tech acts as an intermediary between hospitals and medical supply companies, making hospitals more efficient by automating processes like managing inventory and addressing supply chain disruptions. In August, the company announced it had raised $10.5 million in strategic funding, led by General Catalyst and joined by the venture funds of top health systems including Kaiser Permanente Ventures.
Yuan said Clarium is tackling a big and often overlooked pain point in healthcare with its supply-chain focus. "It's a very cool company I would love to invest in at some point," she said.
CodaMetrix
Recommended by: Lynne Chou O'Keefe, Define Ventures
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $95 million
What it does: CodaMetrix's tech automates healthcare revenue cycle management.
Why it's on the list: CodaMetrix grabbed a $40 million Series B in March to tackle one of the hottest use cases for AI in healthcare right now: billing and claims. Spun out of Mass General Brigham in 2019, O'Keefe said CodaMetrix's origins and its resulting partnerships with top health systems have aided the startup in prioritizing cost, quality, and compliance.
"We believe their focus on the workflow for both physicians and medical coders is a critical part of success, ensuring their solution becomes fully integrated and eventually a vital platform for some of the largest health systems in the U.S," she said.
Ezra
Startup: Ezra
Recommended by: Sara Deshpande, Maven Ventures
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $41 million
What it does: Ezra's AI tech pairs with full-body MRI scans for early detection of health conditions like cancer.
Why it's on the list: Deshpande highlighted Ezra's focus on preventive care, a rarity in the US healthcare system, and personalized access to health data. Ezra's tech is making MRI scans faster, too — the scans currently take thirty minutes, and CEO Emi Gal told Business Insider in February at the time of Ezra's $21 million Series B raise that the company is aiming to get that down to 10 minutes. Deshpande noted that the accuracy of Ezra's AI should continue to improve over time.
Charlie Ehlert
Recommended by: Liam Donohue, .406 Ventures
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $1.45 million
What it does: Equality AI helps healthcare organizations develop and deploy AI ethically.
Why it's on the list: Equality AI, cofounded in 2021, graduated from the Alchemist Accelerator earlier this year to reduce unconscious bias in healthcare AI models. It's launched several health system pilots this year and built a strong pipeline of prospective clients, Donohue said.
"We believe that smart, healthcare-specific guardrails will be essential for AI to realize its full promise. We particularly like that EqualityAI allows for the creation and execution of policies," Donohue said, adding, "What they do is critical, and their momentum is impressive."
Grow Therapy
Startup: Grow Therapy
Recommended by: Chris Farmer, SignalFire
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $178 million
What it does: Grow Therapy helps therapists start and run their own practices, and provides virtual and in-person mental healthcare to patients.
Why it's on the list: "Grow handles the busy work like credentialing, billing, scheduling, note-taking, and follow-ups so therapists can focus on their patients and control their own schedule instead of being overworked and underpaid at someone else's practice," Farmer said.
"It gets therapists' work covered by insurance, democratizing access to patients who can't pay out of pocket. And Grow helps therapists expand their business by listing them on every marketplace including their own that uses AI to match them with patients, reducing burnout for therapists by letting them concentrate on care for conditions they truly understand."
Health Note
Startup: Health Note
Recommended by: Yuanling Yuan, SignalFire
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $24 million
What it does: Health Note automates clinical documentation around patient intake, doctor's visits, and post-visit follow-ups.
Why it's on the list: While a number of companies are competing to provide AI-powered medical scribe software to hospitals, Yuan said Health Note is unique because it seeks to automate documentation across the entire patient experience — from filling out intake forms to visiting the doctor's office and checking in with patients after their care — and to surface clinical insights along that journey.
Yuan said Health Note has trained its AI on millions of patient records and thus can be dynamic in the patient intake process, asking the right questions of a patient and delivering a complete health picture to their doctors.
Hello Heart
Startup: Hello Heart
Recommended by: Sara Deshpande, Maven Ventures
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $138 million
What it does: Hello Heart's app, paired with a connected blood pressure monitor, helps patients manage their cardiovascular health at home.
Why it's on the list: Hello Heart "was a very early pioneer in AI-driven health insights since inception; this year, they've continued to strengthen their leadership team while growing impressively across all business metrics and helping improve the health of their customers," Deshpande said.
The startup now boasts more than 100 customers, from employers and health plans to governments and labor unions, Deshpande said. She pointed to a May study published in the Journal of the American Heart Association that found usage of Hello Heart program helped patients reduce their blood pressure, cholesterol, and weight.
Jaan Health
Startup: Jaan Health
Recommended by: Elizabeth Yin, Hustle Fund
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $12 million
What it does: Jaan Health offers text-based care coordination for patients with chronic conditions and their providers.
Why it's on the list: Jaan Health's software, called Phamily, helps reduce the labor and cost burdens associated with chronic condition management, Yin said.
"There's a lot of talk about AI, but Jaan Health is a poster child for how AI can help people. To date, they've automated millions of messages to patients, reducing work for providers to increase care at lower time and monetary cost," she said.
NeuroFlow
Startup: NeuroFlow
Recommended by: Mark Goldstein, Builders VC
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $57 million
What it does: NeuroFlow creates behavioral health solutions to help healthcare organizations better track and support patients in between appointments.
Why it's on the list: NeuroFlow provides an app for patients to track their mental health alongside backend tools that alert clinicians to potential risks in their patient populations. The startup published a study in February of its AI tech that uses natural language processing of patients' journal entries in its app to detect suicidal ideation and help providers intervene earlier.
Goldstein said NeuroFlow has been picking up steam and has now graduated to become an active acquirer in behavioral health. The company most recently bought measurement-based care company Owl in June.
"I think any of the companies that are going to be successful in mental and behavioral health have to be this way," Goldstein said. "You can't possibly build all of this yourself."
NOCD
Recommended by: Alyssa Jaffee, 7wireVentures
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $84 million
What it does: NOCD offers virtual care for obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Why it's on the list: NOCD works with dozens of health plans to provide hard-to-get OCD care through its more than 300 specialized therapists. Jaffee noted that NOCD taps AI "to ensure that only top therapists are joining the NOCD network through rigorous evaluation." NOCD's data platform also uses AI for personalized content and better patient-therapist matching across its backend tech for therapists and its app for patients, she said.
NOCD last raised a $34 million funding round in February 2023, co-led by 7wireVentures and Cigna Ventures.
Pelago
Startup: Pelago
Recommended by: Mark Goldstein, Builders VC
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $151 million
What it does: Pelago provides virtual care for substance use disorders.
Why it's on the list: Pelago provides addiction care benefits for substance use disorders including alcohol, tobacco, and opioids, with a combination of telehealth, remote monitoring, access to prescriptions, and virtual therapy sessions. It's working with large businesses and health plans including MetLife, Phillips, and GE Appliances. The startup landed a $58 million Series C led by Atomico in March.
"They are making great progress, and in my mind, represent the type of mental health company that can build a big moat and own its niche — and it's a big one," Goldstein said.
Photon Health
Startup: Photon Health
Recommended by: Michael Greeley, Flare Capital Partners
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $16.4 million
What it does: Photon Health's pharmacy fulfillment platform allows patients to receive their prescriptions on their phones and shop around for lower costs at nearby pharmacies.
Why it's on the list: Photon Health's prescribing tools use AI to improve prescription ordering and fulfillment, reducing costs while increasing the rates of script fulfillment and medication adherence, Greeley said. Flare Capital Partners led Photon Health's $9 million seed round in August. The startup has landed partnerships with some big names in healthcare, from WeightWatchers to Mark Cuban's Cost Plus Drugs.
"As the prescriber and retailer network scales with prescription volume, patients will be afforded lower-cost medication fulfillment options with greater convenience," Greeley said.
David Beyda
Recommended by: Liam Donohue, .406 Ventures
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $95 million
What it does: Redox's platform allows providers, payers, and other healthcare organizations to easily connect to healthcare data sources including medical records systems.
Why it's on the list: "While many companies are able to move data asynchronously, Redox is the only company that delivers full-service, real-time healthcare data interoperability that not only integrates clinical data into enterprise workflows and AI models, but also writes data back into source systems," Donohue said.
He added that Redox has landed more than 95 clients in 2024 so far, and has notched partnerships with Microsoft, AWS, Google, Databricks, and Snowflake.
Rippl
Recommended by: Alyssa Jaffee, 7wireVentures
Relationship: No financial interest
Total funding: $32.5 million
What it does: Rippl provides value-based mental healthcare to seniors.
Why it's on the list: Launched in 2022, Rippl has made key strides in dementia care this year, including notching a partnership with the Alzheimer's Association and expanding its dementia-care services into new states like Texas, Jaffee noted. Rippl also acquired AI-powered dementia startup Kinto in April to help train and support more dementia caregivers.
Sensi.AI
Recommended by: Scott Barclay, Insight Partners
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $53.5 million
What it does: Sensi.AI provides home care tools to assist caregivers.
Why it's on the list: Sensi.AI aims to reduce caregiver burden with its AI tech that uses audio analysis to detect, respond to, and record "care events," which can include everything from the patient calling for help to taking a shower. The tech then notifies the caregivers if immediate action is necessary, and creates optimized care plans based on the insights it collects.
"What we love about Sensi is deep, validated data science, deployed with empathy into the home, but with a realistic initial distribution strategy that turns home caregivers into superheroes," Barclay said. "They've built a valuable platform with deep technical moats from sophisticated AI and a proprietary dataset. We believe they have a wedge into a large and growing market, with huge opportunities to expand across modalities, customer segments, and use cases."
Solara Health
Recommended by: Lynne Chou O'Keefe, Define Ventures
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $4.5 million
What it does: Solara Health is building AI copilots for behavioral health.
Why it's on the list: Solara Health, which is still in stealth mode, wants to address healthcare's labor shortage with more efficient care starting in behavioral health, O'Keefe said. She said its AI platform helps automate both administrative and clinical tasks for healthcare workers to deliver high-quality, personalized mental health treatment to patients.
Solara raised a $4.5 million seed round in February, the company told BI. The startup said it also uses AI to help automate evidence-based treatments and training in behavioral health to help clinicians operate at the top of their licenses.
Waymark
Recommended by: Deena Shakir, Lux Capital
Relationship: Investor
Total funding: $87 million
What it does: Waymark helps providers manage care for patients on Medicaid.
Why it's on the list: Waymark, a public benefit corporation, designs technology and mobilizes community health workers to improve care for Medicaid patients. Shakir said Waymark "boasts some of the most impactful applications of AI in healthcare that I've seen," pointing to its algorithm's 90% accuracy in predicting avoidable ER and hospital utilization for Medicaid patients, according to a study published January in the Nature journal Scientific Reports.