GE Ventures and StartUp Health Expand Partnership To Invest In and Coach Digital Health Entrepreneurs

Expanded Program will Focus on Health Payment and Virtual Health Solutions

Santa Clara, CA (PRWEB) October 06, 2015

GE Ventures and StartUp Health, a global health innovation company, today announced the expansion of their partnership to invest in and coach startups focused on several areas of healthcare innovation. The program builds on the success of the GE and StartUp Health Entrepreneurship Program, which launched in 2013 with 15 consumer health companies.

Over the next year, StartUp Health Academy and GE Ventures will accept at least 10 new, qualified companies into the program. This initial call for applicants is aimed at entrepreneurs working on virtual health platforms and next generation payment solutions, and additional innovation themes will be announced within the year. Selected companies will be invited to join the StartUp Health Academy for three years and be eligible for a $50,000 investment, with the opportunity for additional investment as they progress. The program is designed to help startups commercialize and grow by providing access to GE Ventures' executives and technology experts as well as StartUp Health Academy's coaching and global network of investors and customers.

"Our initial program's participants have hit some amazing milestones – including two follow-on investments from GE Ventures and one acquisition by a major healthcare company," said Ruchita Sinha, Director of Healthcare, GE Ventures. "We look forward to extending the program to a new group of entrepreneurs, offering them StartUp Health's powerful platform to gain traction, and GE's global network to help them scale."

"From day one, we've had a synced vision with GE Ventures - to foster innovation that will make a big difference in transforming every aspect of healthcare," said Steven Krein, co-founder and CEO of StartUp Health. "We believe unique collaborations are required between extraordinary entrepreneurs and the world's industry leaders like GE in order to fix today's most complex healthcare challenges."

"Our long-term partnership with GE Ventures is part of our ongoing strategy to bring together a collaboratory of the world's healthcare leaders to speed up the cycles of transforming healthcare by providing entrepreneurs with ongoing support, expertise and investment," said Katya Hancock, director of the StartUp Health Network.

The program will initially support startups and early-stage growth companies that fit any of the following two areas of focus:

Payment solutions including network offerings, point solutions and claims free economy:
●Network offerings that include: supporting private exchanges, provider cost and performance analytics, healthcare payments and remittance clearinghouses, health information exchanges, claims dispute management, fraud monitoring and mitigation, provider database and credentialing, online consumer portals and apps.
●Point solutions that include: e-wallets, patient eligibility verification and liability estimation, electronic receivables management, point of care consumer payment processing, e-pay or tokenized payment processing, online shopping sites.
●Claims-free economy solutions that include: subscriptions, flat-fees, shopping sites for health.

Virtual health platforms:
●Virtual health platforms that enable clinician-to-clinician engagement, specialist referral, interpretation services, second opinions, clinician-to-patient engagement, remote monitoring, e-visits/consultations, store-forward diagnosis.

How to apply to the GE Ventures and StartUp Health Academy Entrepreneurship Program
Companies may apply starting today at StartUpHealth.com/GE. Companies that apply by November 2, 2015 will be considered for acceptance this year. Companies that have previously applied to (or are already in) StartUp Health Academy will also be considered for this opportunity and should complete a new application.

About GE Ventures
GE Ventures identifies, scales and accelerates ideas that will help make the world work better. Focused on the areas of software, advanced manufacturing, energy and healthcare, GE Ventures combines equity investing, new business creation, licensing and technology transfer to deliver an innovation platform designed to drive growth for partners and GE. For more information, please visit http://www.geventures.com or follow on Twitter (@GE_Ventures) and LinkedIn.

About StartUp Health
StartUp Health is a global health innovation company. The StartUp Health Platform, including its Academy, Network and Innovation Fund, is empowering a global network of entrepreneurs and innovators to transform healthcare. With over 100 companies, StartUp Health has the world's largest portfolio of digital health companies from 11 countries and more than 50 cities. StartUp Health was founded in 2011 by Steven Krein and Unity Stoakes and is chaired by former Time Warner CEO, Jerry Levin. StartUp Health's notable strategic partners and investors include AARP, AON, Aurora Health Care, California Healthcare Foundation, Steve Case, Cleveland Clinic, Conifer Health Solutions, Mark Cuban, Esther Dyson, Roger Ehrenberg, Brad Feld, GE Ventures, Kaiser Permanente Ventures, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, SeventySix Capital and Stericycle. Learn more at startuphealth.com.

Contact:
Startup Health
Anna McKeon, 814-602-7749
anna(at)startuphealth(dot)com

Sloane PR
Darren Brandt
dbrandt(at)sloanepr(dot)com

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/10/prweb13002281.htm