At a recent webinar at MedCity News and sponsored by commercial banking providers, venture capitalists shared their views on health technology, MedTech and Biopharma industry trends that attracted their interest and funding. They also advise startups looking for other sources of funding than government grants.
The impact of artificial intelligence and automation on time-consuming tasks, especially determining drug development goals, is another important part of the discussion.
Gurdane Bhutani is a managing partner at MBX Capital, an early-stage venture capital fund specializing in healthcare and biotech companies that pursue the root causes of people getting sick. Butani noted that the company invested in three verticals: upstream drivers of human health outcomes; a health technology business that leverages AI to improve care quality; and biotechnology research tools, diagnostics and therapeutics. Badani’s training focuses on epidemiology and toxicology.
Morgan Cheatham is a partner and director of Breyer Capital, a venture capital firm founded by Jim Breyer, one of Facebook’s earliest investors. It focuses on early-stage startup investments at the intersection of healthcare, life sciences and technology. The two main organizational principles of its investment are AI and precision medicine. Cheatham also received training as a geneticist.
Ben Kromnick built a big data and machine learning platform in the Fortune 100 healthcare and insurance business before becoming the founder, investor and operator of several clinical research informatics and EHR companies. He works with some of the largest clinical data sets, health systems and pharmaceutical companies. Using this experience, he is building a healthcare and life science business at Mercury.
During the webinar, panelists highlighted their company’s healthcare startup investment and collaboration strategies. Although AI is the main topic of discussion, the panelists focus on the direct impact of its professional application in the field and its impact on equity valuation and company development strategies.
“If you are a company that focuses on the autoimmune space and is developing regulators, you should focus on immunogenicity, which is a key risk to your plan,” Cheatham notes. “ Rather than focusing on large platform entities that focus on multiple indicator areas, focus on AI, highly specialized models that specifically target the immunogenicity of their plan because they can increase the likelihood of success.”
Cheatham also pointed out the importance of validating data in vivo, which has driven many of the external business development efforts of its company starting with its biopharmaceutical business. This in vivo data drives the next financing milestone for startups.
Some other discussion points in the webinar include:
- Granting financial secrets
- Capital Valuation
- Lean startup tips for effective growth
- Use AI to reduce risk
- Role of the Home Office
To access the recording of the webinar, fill out the form below.
*Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided through Select Financial Group (NA) and FDIC member Evolve Bank & Trust.
photo: Alan Thornton, Getty Images
