What Would Lisa Suennen Say?
I’m sick. I have some nasty bronchitis thing and it sucks. There is nothing worse than a sick healthcare industry person. We are the worst patients ever because we know all the things that can go wrong and we know all the ways we can make ourselves worse. And that makes us even crankier than […]
Caveat Emptor, Caveat Venditor. That is my official blog post foreshadowing. The digital health rocket seems to have gotten supercharged lately, at least when it comes to fundraising. Depending on who you ask, either $1.62 billion (Rock Health’s count) or $2.5 billion (Mercom) or $2.8 billion (Startup Health’s count) was plowed into digital health companies […]
Although his dad was a prominent politician who eventually became Speaker of the House, AliveCor Founder Dave Albert always knew he wanted to a career in medicine – it was the passion he discovered for engineering and entrepreneurship that took him, and his career, by surprise. While Dave chose a very different path than his […]
I broke a thousand hearts Before I met you I’ll break a thousand more, baby Before I am through. -Lyrics to Bad to the Bone by George Thorogood Last week I had a startup entrepreneur come to me with an idea about how to “pivot” his company strategy. The company, which had begun as a […]
In my nearly 20 years in healthcare venture capital, I have heard at least 37 million pitches for technology solutions to help patients be healthy, get healthy, stay healthy, One of the questions I most frequently ask entrepreneurs is this: What patient research have you done? How many potential consumers/customers have you interviewed to know […]
Jessica Mega, an accomplished cardiologist and now Chief Medical Officer at Alphabet’s Verily (formerly Google Life Sciences), says she joined the venerable Silicon Valley company to help patients. According to Jess, physicians who love patients need to lean into the tech world because great tech that doesn’t actually change care doesn’t have much of a […]
Deborah Kilpatrick grew up on a family farm in rural George; her dad was a teacher and football coach; she describes life in her town as “very Friday Night Lights.” With a passion for math and science, Deb decided to becoming a Ramblin’ Wreck at Georgia Tech, continuing on there for a masters and PhD […]
It’s the first of the new year and of course that can mean only one thing: the avalanche of stories about how much was or wasn’t invested in digital health and whether the current environment favors/disfavors growth in this sector and all that jazz. It used to be, once upon a time, that the advent […]
Many entrepreneurs and investors on our podcast advise would-be innovators to focus on the problem to be solved, rather than become wrapped up in a particular technology. “Your solution,” VC Dave McClure famously warned entrepreneurs, “Is not my problem.” On the other hand, many scientists – and students of science – have emphasized the pivotal […]
Rasu Shrestha, MD is one of those doctors who found his way from medicine to technology. As he puts it, he rolled downhill from his birthplace in Kathmandu, Nepal, across many continents and into medical school in India. But Rasu kept rolling, finding his way to London, Los Angeles and then Pittsburgh, PA where he […]
Lisa Suennen is a venture capital investor and the managing partner of Venture Valkyrie, LLC, which publishes the Venture Valkyrie blog and co-produces the Tech Tonics podcast. She is also co-founder of CSweetener, a women's healthcare mentoring organization.