Clinicians needs to be the epicentre of Health-Tech Startup Ecosystem

Pick the top ten successful startups in the last three or four decades, namely Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Flipkart, etc. Look at their founders’ qualifications, experience, and the core competency of the startup. Bill Gates was one of the earliest coders of his time, and built a computing company. Google brothers did a PhD in search engine algorithms, and built the world’s most popular search engine. Steve Jobs would trade hardware at a flea market as a kid, and built the company that boasts of impeccable and unique hardware finishes. Case in point, the qualifications and experience of founders does impact the long term success and vision of the startup.

Health tech startups have had their fair share of notoriety for not targeting the real consumer problems, but just serving what was possible through technology. This was a common feature of health tech initiatives started (and ended) by the big tech companies, and the health tech startups founded by non-medical founders with little or no engagement with medical experts. Some healthcare startups (e.g. Babylon and Livongo) have had success with PhD and engineer founders, but they are more of an outlier. To improve the odds of success for the healthcare startups, the subject matter experts of the field will have to become the entrepreneurs, solve the real problems with the solutions that would really work.

Clinicians (including doctors, nurses, and other medical staff) are limited by their understanding of the technology and coding. Two trends, rise of physicians who code and introduction of no code portals, are alleviating this lacuna. Now, clinicians have the tools to bring the change that healthcare needs and deserves. On top of that, the clinicians are becoming investors with a focussed portfolio of healthcare. In an ecosystem where healthcare problems are worked up, funded by, and solved through the direct involvement of the clinicians, the success rate of health tech startups would surpass that of the fintech or retail-tech sector.

White Hole Hub (WHH) provides an opportunity for all the health tech startups to get associated with the clinicians in the form of investors, mentors, or team members. The objective of WHH is to improve the odds of success for the associated companies.