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AHA and Furthur Fund launch startup competition to drive innovation in health systems

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The preponderance of healthcare startups that have sprung up promising to advance the industry have run headlong into the challenge of translating real innovation to existing healthcare stakeholders.

This barrier continues to exist even as the need for healthcare innovation has grown starker, with the shift towards value-based payment and the entrance of new players with the ability to shake up traditional business models.

In response to these challenges, the American Hospital Association has launched a startup competition in collaboration with Chicago-based Futhur Fund to identify promising young companies with the potential of making real impact for healthcare providers.

The inaugural AHA Leadership Summit Startup Competition will feature six early stage technology startups with practical and tactical innovations that can drive a real return on investment for hospitals. The companies will present at the AHA Leadership Summit on July 25, which will gather hundreds of top hospital executives in San Diego.

Furthur Fund co-founder Jordan Dolin said the collaboration was formed to better align incentives for hospitals, potential investors and startups.

“The point was that if hospitals want to see innovative solutions they have to pay somebody a ton of money like a consulting firm,” Dolin said.

“We formed this partnership in response to the fact that if you want to fix the innovation ecosystem, you can’t have a model where one group succeeds at the expense of another. Hospitals are in the business of providing care, not vetting startups.”

Alongside outside startups, the competition will also be open to hospital “intrapreneurs” who have developed their own products internally and are looking to scale across the industry.

In order to overcome the aforementioned challenges in onboarding healthcare innovation, the competition will use screening process based on Furthur Fund’s existing model for sorting through potential healthcare investments.

A few criteria used to select companies are a clear and measurable ROI for provider customers, a streamlined implementation strategy that fits into existing workflows and strategic goals that align with larger health system priorities like affordability of care, population health and performance improvement.

“One of the big themes in speaking with leaders is that ability to measure ROI is more important than the magnitude of the ROI itself,” Dolin said. “Hospitals jump up-and-down for a 2x ROI for things that they can prove.”

He mentioned revenue cycle management as one particular area of focus, particularly with regards to debt reduction and uncompensated care.

Andrew Shin, the chief operating officer for the AHA Center for Health Innovation, said his division was founded in response to the rapid pace of innovation and changes in the healthcare system and the new competition is one way to harness that advancement.

“As our members continue to lead the transformation of care delivery, organizations and communities, our charge is to support this ecosystem and its diverse stakeholders to advance our vision for a society where all individuals reach their highest potential for health,” Shin said in a statement.

“The inaugural AHA Leadership Summit Startup Competition is one way the Center is enabling this charge.”

Interested companies can apply for the competition here. The deadline for applications is June 1.

Photo: akindo, Getty Images

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