That’s a Wrap: Things We Learned at the 2020 StartUp Health Festival
The 8th annual gathering of Health Transformers and industry change makers broke the ceiling this year with record attendance, 3,000 scheduled business meetings and enough love to warm even the chilliest San Francisco morning.
Watch our two live stream channels — one from the Health Moonshot Stage and one from StartUP Health TV studio — to replay every moment.
Today concluded the 8th annual StartUp Health Festival, and it’s official — the two-day experience has become the must-attend event during the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference. The 2020 Festival brought together thousands of Health Transformers and digital innovators along with professional athletes, filmmakers, award-winning health tech journalists and industry heavyweights. The common connection? A shared commitment to transforming health through the spirit of collaboration and entrepreneurship.
Living up to its reputation as the “Burning Man of Health” the Festival was a space where boundary-pushing ideas, authentic collaboration and creativity were celebrated as necessary elements of health transformation. Over the span of two days (Jan 13–14), 3,000 investment and strategic business meetings were held on the upper floor of the event venue, while the big ideas in health were discussed by investors, VPs, entrepreneurs and patients alike on the Health Moonshot Stage. The stage was graced by Dr. David Feinberg, VP of Google Health, Esther Dyson, Executive Founder of Wellville, legendary CEO Dr. Toby Cosgrove, Advisor to Google Cloud and Cleveland Clinic, and CEOs of some of the world’s top pharmaceutical companies. Not to mention more than a hundred entrepreneurs. Additionally, this year, an entire floor was dedicated to StartUp Health TV to interview more than 100 of the world’s top health entrepreneurs.
The 2020 Festival set a new bar for the kind of future-minded collaboration needed in health, but we’re still in the first inning of what we know will be a very long game. This year, as we look ahead to the start of a new decade for health innovation, the global army of Health Transformers will grow and we will commit to sharing the progress made on health moonshots. We commit to returning to the Festival, as we always have, to bring that army of Health Transformers together around the bold vision of improving the health and wellbeing of billions of lives. See you in 2021.
Cue the highlight reel.
Dr. David Feinberg, VP of Google Health shares health innovation predictions for 2040
On day two, Feinberg laid out his personal health moonshots as the newly appointed head of Google Health including: using AI to improve breast cancer screening and computer imaging to improve diagnostic accuracy; and save billions of years of lives each year by using AI to improve disease prediction. “We’ve built the wrong health system but the tools we’re creating at Google Health can help us rebuild,” said Feinberg.
Health DisrutHERs at the 2020 Festival
Similar to previous years, the StartUp Health Festival offered a measure of hope that women are finally leading the charge in guiding health innovation. Forty-one percent of StartUp Health portfolio companies in attendance had a female co-founder, and 35% of scheduled speakers on stage and in front of the camera in the StartUp Health TV Studio were women. More than a head count, the Festival held space for critical conversations about women’s health. Like maternal morbidity rates, menopause in the workplace and pelvic health.
“The Menopause Zeitgeist captures the top perimenopause and post-menopause symptoms women faced in 2019 — and what women want in 2020.” –Jill Angelo, CEO of Gennev
StartUp Health Magazine Issue 5 Hot of the Presses!
You could say that issue five of the award-winning StartUp Health Magazine is the print version of the 2020 StartUp Health Festival. From Women’s Health to Cancer, from Nigeria to Kansas City, we’ve brought the most inspiring and impactful stories from the StartUp Health family to life in these pages, and then we shared them with the world. During the StartUp Health Festival, we also took to the streets giving away nearly 2000 copies in downtown San Francisco. Sign up for you free copy of “The Collaboration Issue” on startuphealth.com/magazine.
106 health entrepreneurs share their stories LIVE on StartUp Health TV
This year we did something new at the Festival. We created the StartUp Health TV studio and gave more than 100 Health Transformers the opportunity to explain their passion and products with the world. We broadcasted live for two days, and all 106 interviews are available on our YouTube channel. “This storytelling marathon is worth a watch by anyone curious about the future of health,” says Logan Plaster, host of StartUp Heath TV. “You’ll not only learn about the latest and greatest in tech — everything from cancer detection to brain health to menopause — you’ll leave with a sense of hope about where the entire industry is heading.”
Digital health entrepreneur?
Don’t make the journey alone. Learn more about the StartUp Health Community and how StartUp Health invests.
