Quick Pulses of Full Conversation: Tachyons, Soundbites, Takeaways..
The Human Element in Tech: Sharing Personal Stories
And I'm so glad just, you know, I couldn't agree more with what you said. And it's so well said. There's really not much more to add, except the last thing I'll just say is like, it's that human element, right? Like the more we talk about tech, then we're trying to bring it back. And I will say like, Michael, every time you share about your dad, it really like touches me every time. The fact that you're so open about it and how challenging that is. Like, I never think, you know, you've never said it. And I'm like, oh yeah, I know that. Like every time you say it, I'm like, yeah, like that is challenging. And I just, I hope you continue to share those stories because to Susie, to your point, if we can find that the companies that have the technologies that that can actually help people in their day-to-day living because at the end of the day like we're all human and if it's not us it's our parents our siblings our kids our spouses like we want better health all around and i agree with you 100 susie that i mean people are like really talking about the story and the storytelling but it's really just being genuine about that story right it's really like what that means because so many companies are so mission driven like there's something at their core that they're really fundamentally trying to solve for. And I feel like all of us are a part of that in a different way. So anyway, with that, Michael, I'll let you close us out, but thank you for always bringing us together.
Embracing New Ventures in the VC Space
So let's see, personally, but slash professionally, my big thing this year is that I am at the end of last year, decided to be a limited partner for Scrub Capital. And so I am super excited for Scrub. Yeah, thanks. You know, I've been looking into the VC space for a while, trying to figure out like where it made sense to land. And I just met them when we were at Health, actually. I was just really impressed, um, with, I met Rebecca in person and then sort of knew of Chrissy and John and was just really impressed with this idea of creating a fund, um, with physicians and clinicians in mind. And so I'm super excited to see like what they have in store and I'm incredibly grateful to be a part of it. And I, uh, have a lot to learn. And I figured, you know, the best way is just to jump in and, and to be a part of it. And so there was already a bit of a community around it that obviously is continuing to grow. So it's really exciting and, you know, I love doing this with the two of you because I feel like we all kind of come at it from a bit of a different angle, but we compliment each other and it works,
The Overlooked Role of Health Systems in Innovation
I was able to interact a little bit more with health systems and with clinicians and physicians last year than I was at health. And it may just be because I was busy talking to med device companies and things like that. But I'd really love to be able to bring in more health systems and more folks that work inside of health systems to talk about what they're looking for in the coming year and what tools are new for them that have been useful for them. And especially from that AI perspective, but from a medical device perspective as well. I think it's important to stay up on the pulse of this. But I feel like we talk about innovation and healthcare innovation a lot in our ecosystem and in this medtech ecosystem. And we talk to investors and we talk to M&A departments from the big strategics. And we talk to all of these different groups. But oftentimes I feel like the health systems are kind of an afterthought to the conversations. And this ecosystem is so important. We wouldn't be able to do any of this without them using the products.
Overview of the MedTech Innovator Program
So MedTech Innovator is a program that runs from January to October and they usually get about 2000 applications a year and go through several cycles of vetting of the different companies before they select the final 65. Typically about 65 companies go through their accelerator and they are a nonprofit organization and this going through their accelerator is free. It doesn't cost the companies anything. It can actually win money in the end. But the cool thing about them is, is that they're supported by a lot of the large strategic. So you think about J&J, American Association, some plastic surgery association, American Heart Association. And then all the strategics like the Medtronics of the world usually play a role in what they're doing. And I hope Medtronic is one of them. I might be speaking out of term. But they support. No, I'm just saying. bring in they bring in um a lot of their their team to help support these companies so by the time they graduate from the program they have been mentored and vetted by some of the top people in the field throughout the world so it's a really really great program
Food as Medicine and Longevity: A New Focus for Health
trying to get rid of sugar. I mean, it's I know it's a no brainer, but it's just like trying to live a life. And this isn't just like New Year's resolution, but it is sort of just it's a good reset. You know, the food we eat and kind of our lifestyle is so much. I'm hoping to see a lot more companies, a lot more conversations, how that can empower with doctor, physician led, smartly led, you know, because it really is metabolic. These health practices can really, I think, make a long difference in our overall health care when we adapt and adopt to them, I'm hoping. So that's my hope. And we're going to see a lot more in the food is medicine realm. I think with the new administration coming in, there being a push for it. I think that's going to be really helpful. I know not everybody thinks the new administration is going to be good for med tech, but I think there are going to be a lot of spaces where it can be. And so I'm really trying to be optimistic about that coming out. But I think longevity and food is medicine are two really important topics, especially now that our aging population, it continues to grow.
Powerful Marketing: Lessons from Apple's Storytelling
That commercial brings tears to my eyes. Apple has been great at that from day one. It's one of the things that has set them apart and made them These simple commercials that tell the story, tell me a story without telling me what they didn't have to tell me what the product does. You know, the commercial showed me that, hey, this guy can't hear what his kids are doing and now he can. And that's awesome. So I feel like those kind of things set the tone for it. And I see too many startups in this space. that learn to pitch to investors and then keep pitching the same way when they're trying to pitch to health systems or trying to pitch to people who who they want to adopt their product and the pitch shouldn't be the same the pitch should be about what are you doing for me how are you making my life better how are you solving a problem for the world and if you can tell me that without saying a word or takes like some of the apple magic that they have it's just amazing like it's amazing to me how they can continue to tell their story in such a compelling way over and over and over and over again And so many others can't. Like, what is that secret sauce that they have that enables them to have that great ability? But I love that.
Understanding and Actionable Application of AI in 2025
So I think over the next year, we'll start to get people to understand kind of the differences between like automations and AI agents and whether or not you really need AI to make your technology great. It's such a buzzword that I think a lot of people have kind of tried to jump on the AI train and aren't really sure where they're going with it. So I'm starting to see companies come out, come to the forefront that are helping other companies strategize around where they can use it and where they can't, which I think will be a good thing to offer in the next year too. I'll piggyback off of that. And I think from 2024, we talked a lot about AI in general. But for 2025, it seems there's a really big push on making it actionable. And what does that really mean? And so we know the technologies are there. We now expect that most of the technologies have some sort of AI embedded in them. But how do we really act upon that? And from the clinical perspective, how do we actually integrate that into the workflow and make it matter?
Cryptocurrency in Healthcare Financing
And crypto and Bitcoin. Are you guys into Bitcoin yet? I have a little bit of doge that I bought a million years ago and outside of that I think I have like 0.5 of bitcoin somewhere too but outside of that no oh my gosh I don't have any I'm I'm so impressed yeah I've got sorry go ahead I'm just going to say somebody that that's really familiar with it at one point said buy this bitcoin I'm like I'll buy a little bit of it and see what happens so it's just saying I don't even know what it's worth or if it's worth anything so. Yeah. The only thing I know, my little nephew works at a Bitcoin mining company. He's in, he just seemed to be graduating. He studies computer science and then also finance. And he just got me talking. He just talked and talked during July 4th weekend when we caught up and he got me in and, um, i i think everyone the fact that black blackrock and a lot of these big financial firms are saying about one to two percent allocation bit we're just talking bitcoin we're not talking all the cryptos like doge and whatnot or you know it's all speculative but it just and then so i Also got into micro strategies, which is Michael Saylor. He's this he owns more Bitcoin, his firm. It's a publicly traded company. So I don't know. I just think it's something interesting. And I would hope that we'd see some intermediary finance and solutions that might come out of it with health care, a way to fund health care, a way to maybe if there's a way to get excited about a way that people can more finance their own premiums, some insurance might get sexy or something. I don't know. That's anyway, I'm just throwing it out there. Nice. Like, I mean, anything we can do to help people get the health care they need at an affordable cost would be amazing. And if it means that we've got to bring crypto into the conversation, then let's bring it in. There's too many people in today's world in this day and age.
Notes/ References/Mentions
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