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Good morning, everyone —
After a successful NY Tech Week event, we’re coming back to NYC for another hackathon!
A 1.5-day sprint to build useful AI agents and tools for healthcare, with talks, mentorship, food, and good people. Apply here before 6/18 — space is limited!
Hope to see y'all there!
(If you want to judge or sponsor, reply to this email)
Now, to the health x AI news of the past week:
Will legacy healthcare build its own frontier AI?
Consumer wearable adoption trends
NY Tech Week event recap
22 new tools/partnerships, 14 funding updates, new AI jobs & link-worthy content
Read time: 6 minutes
Our Picks ✨
Highlights if you’ve only got 2 minutes…
1/
Will legacy healthcare build its own frontier AI?
Mayo Clinic and Microsoft announced plans to develop a frontier AI model for healthcare, combining Mayo's clinical expertise and longitudinal patient data with Microsoft's AI infrastructure. Notably, Mayo will own the model, which is designed to support everything from clinical reasoning and diagnosis to treatment recommendations.
This is just days after legal giant Kirkland & Ellis announced a $500M investment to build its own proprietary AI platform rather than relying entirely on third-party legal AI vendors that threaten its business (Harvey, Legora, etc). The logic is straightforward: your data, workflows, and institutional knowledge may become your competitive advantage in an AI-native world.
The question is whether healthcare follows the same path. On paper, proprietary models sound compelling. In practice, most health systems are not software companies, and maintaining frontier AI capabilities is expensive and technically challenging. There's also a risk of creating dozens of disconnected AI silos rather than shared platforms that improve care across the industry.
For what it's worth, I don't think this happens at scale or ends up being a winning strategy. Still, these are interesting announcements and they raise a bigger question: in an AI-native world, is the real advantage proprietary intelligence or proprietary data?
2/
Consumer wearable adoption trends
A new Rock Health report found that wearable adoption has climbed from 13% of U.S. adults in 2015 to 46% today, with 57% of consumers now owning at least one wearable or connected health device. More importantly, it seems people are actually using them. 83% wear their devices at least 5 days per week, and nearly half have stuck with the same wearable ecosystem for 3 years or more.
The bigger shift is what comes next and tying it all into the broader healthcare machine. Companies like Oura and Whoop are moving beyond activity tracking and into healthcare, layering on AI-powered insights, clinician access (ex. Oura and Counsel partnership), and more advanced health monitoring. At the same time, 59% of wearable users say they've already discussed their data with a healthcare provider.
Wearables may be the closest thing healthcare has to a real-time health data feed outside of patients self-reporting how they feel. With the adoption question somewhat answered, will wearables now evolve from self-optimization tools into a new healthcare infrastructure layer sitting between patients and the traditional system? (link)(linkedin)
3/
NY Tech Week event recap
Last week, alongside Maverick Ventures and Cigna Ventures, we hosted founders from Nourish, Superpower, and Counsel Health for a conversation on where consumer health is headed in the age of AI.
All three companies are at the forefront of health AI innovation, but tackling problems from very different angles. Nourish is scaling access to nutrition care following its recent $100M Series C. Counsel Health is building AI-native primary care and recently partnered with Oura. Superpower is helping redefine preventative health through diagnostics, data, and personalized care while going all in on the peptide revolution.
One takeaway that stuck out: the biggest winners may not be the companies trying to replace the healthcare system, but the ones making it work better by embedding into existing networks of care. At the same time, AI is making a more personalized, proactive, and always-on healthcare experience feel increasingly possible at scale.
We spent an hour talking about AI, but every founder kept coming back to the same bottleneck: people. Models improve. Technology evolves. Exceptional talent remains the ultimate competitive advantage.
Great discussion, great crowd, and plenty to be excited about. Wonder where we’ll be 5 years from now… (linkedin)
Tools & Partnerships 🔧
Latest on business, consumer, and clinical healthcare AI tools and partnerships…
TOOLS
Researchers propose a standard for clinical AI data: A Columbia-led team introduced the Medical Event Data Standard (MEDS), a framework designed to standardize EHR data and enable AI models to be shared, validated, and compared across health systems without exchanging patient data. (link)
athenahealth expands AI across revenue cycle: The company unveiled more than 80 AI-powered RCM features aimed at reducing denials, automating prior authorizations, and eliminating administrative work, with early results showing higher payment recovery and fewer insurance-related denials. (link)
Ambience expands AI across inpatient care: The company is bringing its chart-aware intelligence to the full inpatient workflow, using longitudinal patient records to improve documentation and discharge summaries that resolved 91% of information gaps missed by standard approaches. (link)
Anomaly launches AI for managed care leaders: The company introduced an AI platform designed to help managed care executives analyze operations, surface insights, and make faster data-driven decisions across health plan workflows. (link)
Anthropic expands AI security initiative into healthcare: Project Glasswing added 150 organizations across critical sectors, including healthcare, using Anthropic’s advanced AI models. (link)
Fullspan launches AI health companion: Healthline AI helps users find verified health information, navigate care decisions, and access personalized guidance grounded in trusted medical content. (link)
University of Utah Health uses AI to scale Hospital at Home: The health system deployed an AI tool that continuously identifies eligible patients for home-based care, replacing manual chart reviews and helping expand its Heal at Home program. (link)
Google releases Gemma 4 12B: The new multimodal open model is optimized to run on a 16GB laptop and marks the first Gemma variant with native audio capabilities. (link)
Inherent Labs launches AI science platform: Founded by former DeepMind researchers, the startup emerged from stealth with $50M to build self-improving AI systems that help scientists identify and pursue the most promising research questions. (link)
YC-backed Plena launches AI operating system for specialty practices: The platform automates referrals, fax processing, scheduling, and collections workflows, helping specialty clinics streamline ops. (link)
QuantHealth launches predictive competitive intelligence platform: The AI clinical trial simulation company unveiled a new solution that helps pharma companies optimize both trial success and commercial strategy by forecasting competitive dynamics. (link)
Longevitix launches AI platform for longevity medicine: The new clinical intelligence platform aggregates labs, wearables, notes, and health records into physician-ready insights and personalized preventive care plans. (link)
Joint Commission launches AI certification program: The accrediting body introduced a voluntary certification program to help healthcare organizations evaluate and demonstrate the safe, responsible use of AI. (link)
Health sector publishes AI cybersecurity guidance: The Health Sector Coordinating Council released best practices to help healthcare organizations defend against emerging AI-powered cyber threats, including autonomous agentic attacks. (link)
PARTNERSHIPS
OpenAI + Anthropic + Google DeepMind + Microsoft: Leading AI companies joined synthetic DNA industry leaders in urging Congress to require screening and verification of DNA and RNA orders to reduce bioweapons risks as AI advances biological research capabilities. (link)
Owkin + Sanofi: Owkin and Sanofi expanded their AI partnership to develop agentic AI assistants for drug discovery and development using Owkin’s K Pro platform. (link)
Novant Health + Qventus: Novant Health partnered with Qventus to pilot Aubrey, an AI-powered virtual assistant that guides patients through surgical preparation and recovery. (link)
Mount Sinai + Clarium: Mount Sinai partnered with Clarium to deploy AI-powered computer vision technology across its hospitals and surgery centers to automate surgical supply tracking and optimize operating room workflows. (link)
WellSpan Health + Philips: WellSpan Health and Philips launched a seven-year partnership spanning AI-enabled imaging, research, and product co-development across WellSpan’s care network. (link)
ŌURA + Flexpa: ŌURA partnered with Flexpa to integrate clinical records from the TEFCA network into its platform, combining healthcare data with wearable insights to power more personalized AI-driven health guidance. (link)
HeartSciences + Bunkerhill Health: HeartSciences partnered with Bunkerhill Health to launch an AI-ECG marketplace that gives providers access to validated algorithms and offers developers a scalable path to commercial distribution. (link)
Essence Healthcare + ŌURA: Essence Healthcare expanded its partnership with ŌURA to use wearable and AI-driven sleep data to identify members at risk for sleep apnea and support earlier intervention and care management. (link)
Deal Desk 💰
Spotlight on latest capital raises, M&A, and investments…
FUNDING
Lila Sciences, a Cambridge, Mass.-based developer of autonomous scientific labs, is in talks to raise $2B at an $8.5B pre-money valuation, led by CalPERS and NVentures. (link)
NewLimit, a longevity pharma startup, raised $435M at a $3.1B post-money valuation. Founders Fund led, joined by Thrive Capital, Greenoaks, Quiet Capital and insiders Kleiner Perkins and Eli Lilly Ventures. (link)
Chai Discovery, building antibody AI models to find new therapies, is in talks to raise $400M at a $3.4B valuation. (link)
Collate, an SF-based maker of AI tools for life sciences paperwork, raised $95M led by Redpoint Ventures at nearly a $1B valuation. (link)
Adaptive Innovation, a NYC and Dallas-based AI-powered home healthcare company, raised $50M in Series A funding. Felicis led the round and was joined by Bain Capital Ventures, Optum Ventures and others. (link)
Stepful, an AI-powered healthcare training platform, raised $31.5M in Series B funding. The round was led by Oak HC/FT. (link)
Lassie, a San Francisco-based developer of AI agents that automate admin operations for small medical practices, raised $35M in Series A funding. a16z led the round and was joined by others. (link)
Semble, a London-based healthcare management platform, raised £30M in Series C funding. Revaia led. (link)
Subtle Medical, an AI-powered medical imaging software company, raised $33M in a Series C growth financing led by funds managed by Morgan Stanley. (link)
Novellia, an NYC-based real-world pharma data company, raised $18M in Series A funding. Spark Capital led, joined by Khosla Ventures, Acrew Capital, Bling Capital, and TMV. (link)
Ilant Health, an NYC-based AI-powered obesity and cardiometabolic care company, raised $15M in Series A funding. Cornucopian Capital led the round. (link)
Flok Health, a Cambridge, U.K.-based AI-powered physiotherapy company, raised $12.5M in Series A funding. Albion VC led. (link)
M&A
Elation Health + Aster: Elation Health acquired Aster to add voice AI-powered front-office automation capabilities to its EHR and practice management platform. (link)
Elsevier + Wellsheet: Elsevier acquired Wellsheet to combine EHR-derived patient context with ClinicalKey AI’s evidence base, delivering patient-specific clinical guidance directly within clinician workflows. (link)
as of 6/7/26
Other Relevant News 🔍
News, podcasts, blogs, tweets, resources, etc…
AI Job Opportunities 💼
Explore our AI Job Board or contact us to feature roles in our newsletter…
Visuals of the Week 📸
Funny memes, cool pics, and interesting data from around the web…
That’s it for this week friends! Back to reading — I’ll see you next week.
Stay classy,
PS. I write this newsletter for you. So if you have any suggestions or questions, feel free to reply to this email and let me know
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