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Tag Archives: innovation
Striving for Obsolescence
Well thank goodness. I have recently learned that I can be replaced by a piece of software. Work has been pretty taxing lately, so this is quite a relief, as long as they keep paying me. Apparently there is a new data analysis product called Quid that is able to detect what sectors in a given industry are ripe for innovation and direct venture capital investors towards the best opportunities. Since that is a key function of those in the venture capital biz, it is a relief to think that I can outsource it to someone (something?) who won’t bring their personal issues to the office or drink the last of the coffee without replacing the pot.
According to a recent article in Venture Capital Journal (excerpted in PE Hub), you can visualize Quid as follows:
But imagine plugging data into a computer, such as hiring trends and past rounds of funding for thousands of companies in a sector, and then having software that crunches the numbers and predicts what areas are untapped by startups and ripe for investment opportunities. That way, when a gung-ho entrepreneur walks in a … (read the rest)
Healthcare: When Innovation is Not Enough
Earlier this week I had the pleasure of attending an event put together by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, a branch of the US Department Of Health and Human Services whose mission is to improve the quality, safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of health care for all Americans. AHRQ has established an Innovations Exchange designed to speed the implementation of new and better ways of delivering health care. This particular event was called Scale Up and Spread and was designed to let several of the innovations brought to light through the Innovation Exchange be reviewed by a panel of industry people, Shark Tank style.
If you have seen the show Shark Tank, which I wrote about recently, you can appreciate that they called this a Fish Tank event, as the goal was for the panel to provide pointed feedback to the “innovators” but in a constructive and less confrontational manner than you might find in the TV show. Not a shark fin in sight, unless you count the one I had to hide with my cardigan since I was the only private equity person in the … (read the rest)
Posted in Health and Wellness, Healthcare, Healthcare Information Technology, Healthcare Policy, Healthcare Reform, Healthcare Venture Capital, Private Equity, Uncategorized, Venture Capital
Tagged ahrq, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, healthcare, healthcare IT, healthcare private equity, healthcare reform, healthcare venture capital, innovation, psilos, shark tank, venture capital
2 Comments
I, Robot Seal
Two of my most frequently read blog posts have been those I wrote about the telemonitoring robot called Autom and the “mentally ill” stuffed animals called Paraplush. When I saw one of my faithful readers and colleagues, Dorothy Pavloff from California Technology Ventures, the other day, she handed me a flyer for what can best be described as the electronic offspring of Autom and Paraplush, the PARO Robot. I knew I had my next post the minute I saw it.
PARO, according to its flyer, is “an advanced interactive robot which provides psychological and social effects to human beings through physical interaction.” Allow me to translate: we’re talking stuffed baby seal toy that responds to touch, light, movement and sound. In fact, PARO “learns” to engage with its owner, responding to its name and sort of cuddling/purring/squeaking when stroked. I particularly like how their marketing pamphlet notes that “if you hit it, PARO remembers its previous action and tries not to do that action.” Good thing, because it would be a serious bummer if you hit it and it took a swing back at you.
The idea behind … (read the rest)
Posted in Health and Wellness, Healthcare, Healthcare Information Technology, Healthcare Reform, Medical Devices, Uncategorized
Tagged affordable care act, consumer engagement, furreal friends, healthcare, healthcare IT, healthcare reform, innovation, medical technology, PARO, psilos, robot therapy, therapeutic robot
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A Cure for the Common Birthday
There is still no cure for the common birthday.–John Glenn
My birthday is coming up this month and this whole getting older thing is vastly over-rated. I know I’m not the first person to think that gravity has gotten stronger as I have gotten older–as Mark Twain famously once said, “life would be infinitely happier if we could only be born at the age of eighty and gradually approach eighteen.”
Clearly, financing a solution to this particular market need would be the ne plus ultra of healthcare venture capital investments. Dave Barry, one of my favorite writers, once referred to this most supreme of healthcare opportunities by saying, “Thanks to modern medical advances such as antibiotics, nasal spray, and Diet Coke, it has become routine for people in the civilized world to pass the age of 40, sometimes more than once.”
In fact, there are many medical enterprises focused on reducing the effects of aging, particularly the external manifestations. In my 12 years in venture capital I have seen deals that lift faces, restore hair, whiten teeth and return boobs to their original out-of-the-box condition. These products are all … (read the rest)
Posted in Health and Wellness, Healthcare, Healthcare Venture Capital, Real Science, Uncategorized, Venture Capital
Tagged aging, anti-aging, dana farber, dorian gray, healthcare, healthcare venture capital, innovation, life sciences, psilos, ronald dePinho, telomerase, telomeres, venture capital
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You Call That Crazy? Adventures in Ventureland
On November 22, 2010 Business Insider published a list of what it deemed to be the 10 Craziest Start-up Ideas of All Time. There were some pretty entertaining ones on the list. The best one in my view is Game Crush (motto: it’s time to spice up your game!), which lets you pay $0.60 a minute to play Xbox Live games with hot women. According to the article you can rate your ‘PlayDates’ based on ‘hotness’, ‘gaming skill’, and ‘flirtiness’ to “ensure the cream rises to the top” (whatever that means). Sounds like nerd paradise. Apparently it even got funded. The VC world has a pretty high nerd: normal person ratio, so I guess that should not surprise me.
On the list of 10 Crazy Ideas there was only one healthcare-related idea. Considering that healthcare makes up almost 20% of the GDP, you would think that this type of list would have greater healthcare representation. And frankly, the healthcare idea picked for the list is really not so crazy. It’s called Withings, and it is basically a scale with built-in wifi so it can communicate your weight to … (read the rest)
Welcome To Your HIT Parade
The Cleveland Clinic recently published an annual Top 10 list of what their leadership believes to be the most significant advances in medicine in each of the last five years. In 2007-2008 all of the items on the top 10 lists were either medical devices, clinical diagnostics,pharmaceutical or biotech products. These sectors were basically the Beatles of medicine, while healthcare information technology was more like the indie group Florence + the Machine: intriguing, but not likely to be called out on the Billboard Top 10 (or make Cleveland’s own Rock and Roll Hall of Fame) in the immediate future.
Interestingly, healthcare information technology (HIT) applications began to sneak their way onto the Cleveland Clinic Top 10 list over the last two years. In 2009-2010 HIT barely made it, coming in at number 10 in both years. In contrast to all previous years, however, there it was. HIT had made it to the list representing 10% of what one of the nation’s most prestigious medical institutions calls the most significant up-and-coming technologies that can have the biggest impact on health care. In 2011 HIT was number 6 with a bullet, moving … (read the rest)
Posted in Healthcare, Healthcare Information Technology, Healthcare Venture Capital, Medical Devices, Uncategorized, Venture Capital
Tagged ARRA, cleveland clinic, health information exchange, healthcare, healthcare IT, healthcare reform, healthcare venture capital, HIE, HIT, innovation, medical innovation, medical technology, patient safety, psilos, telemonitoring, venture capital
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CMS & CMMI: Taking A Flying Leap
Let me start with what’s important: The Giants are up 2 games to 1 over the Phillies in the NLCS. I am looking forward to collecting on my bet with my partner, Joe Riley, who is a seriously misguided Phillies fan. What the hell is that mascot anyway? Looks like a mutant bigfoot that ran into a brick wall face first.
But back to the subject at hand.
Yesterday I had the opportunity to speak as an invited guest at a public meeting hosted by the Brookings Institution and CMS. The focus of the meeting was “Accelerating Health Care Innovation to Improve Quality and Lower Costs: The Role of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation.” This meeting was the sequel to a private meeting that occurred several months ago in which many people from all facets of the healthcare industry provided input and suggestions to the joint Brookings-CMS team that is defining how the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) will set its goals, operating plans and procedures. As you may recall from an earlier post, CMMI was established as a result of the Affordable Care Act … (read the rest)
Posted in Health and Wellness, Healthcare, Healthcare Information Technology, Healthcare Policy, Healthcare Reform, Healthcare Venture Capital, Patient Safety, Uncategorized
Tagged ACA, affordable care act, brookings, Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, Center for Medicare Innovation, cmi, cmmi, cms, don berwick, healthcare, healthcare IT, healthcare reform, healthcare services, healthcare venture capital, innovation, Office of the National Coordinator, ONC, psilos, richard gilfillan, triple aim
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If You Build It, They Will Come
I had the chance to see Aneesh Chopra speak at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco last Wednesday, August 18th. Chopra is the nation’s first Chief Technology Officer and officially works in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. You know all that healthcare information technology stuff you have been hearing about from Washington, DC? That’s his charge–the good, the bad and the ugly. Must be a daunting job in some ways since the healthcare system has, for a long time, rejected IT like a mismatched kidney.
Chopra is notable for his incredible optimism, deep knowledge of the field and smooth speaking skills. He talked about his view of the role of the federal government in fostering healthcare IT. His vision is that government should act as “convener”, not rule-maker. He wants to let a few thousand flowers bloom by setting up events that draw from public and private industry, big and small companies, and represent the interests of consumers, providers and carriers. So far a few of these events have actually come together. A few of them even threaten to produce something of value, which is great.… (read the rest)
Posted in Healthcare, Healthcare Information Technology, Healthcare Reform, Healthcare Venture Capital, Uncategorized, Venture Capital
Tagged aneesh chopra, apps for healthy kids, ARRA, health 2.0, healthcare, healthcare IT, healthcare reform, healthcare services, healthcare venture capital, innovation, venture capital
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It’s My Life, It’s Now or Never
Any day of the week you can walk into a pharmacy unsupervised and buy a test kit to find out if you’re ovulating so you can undertake family planning activities. You can buy home testing kits to screen for high cholesterol, illicit drug use, even presence of the HIV virus. You can also pony up $500 and buy yourself a genetic test kit from 23andMe to find out what might be in your genetic blueprint so you can make pre-emptive healthcare decisions if you wish. Not to mention the fact that you can drop by Haight Ashbury any Saturday afternoon and get your future told by someone named Sun Muffin and, as a result, decide to make changes in your life to help shape a better future.
While some might look askance at how you get the information you use to make choices about your life, it is rare that someone steps in and tries to stop you from doing so. In general, the American way is to say, “hey, you’re an adult and it’s your life…if you want to engage in self-actualization, whether or not it has a scientific … (read the rest)
Posted in Healthcare, Healthcare Information Technology, Healthcare Reform, Healthcare Venture Capital, Uncategorized, Venture Capital
Tagged berkeley, diagnostics, ehr, electronic health records, genetic testing, healthcare, healthcare IT, healthcare reform, healthcare venture capital, innovation, life sciences, medical technology, personal health record, phr, psilos, venture capital
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Can You Hear Me Now?
In my last post I talked about robots and other technologies used for remote monitoring of patients who are seeking to lose weight or achieve other healthcare goals. One of the biggest challenges with remote monitoring systems, particularly as it relates to consistently and frequently monitoring people with chronic illness, such as heart or lung disease, is compliance. Even when the technology is sitting right there on their kitchen counter, as the Autom or Health Buddy does, sometimes people just ignore it. If you let the system know you were experiencing shortness of breath or a rapid, irregular heartbeat, your doctor could be on the phone to you in well, a heartbeat. Instead, that fancy remote monitoring device sometimes gets used as a handy dandy towel rack, just like that exercise bike in your bedroom does an excellent job of holding up your clothes.
Of course, we all recognize this is just human nature. Your spouse says to you, “don’t talk on the cell phone while you’re driving, “ and, while you’re responding with “don’t tell me what to do, “ you slam into the back of a Mercedes. Human … (read the rest)