Fierce Healthcare | "The Future of Health" (a humble event)
The Future of Health brings together innovators, doers, and creative champions focused on open innovation across startups, corporations, NGOs, and VCs with a day of programming.
This year we will host a single day of "un-conference" programming: panels, keynotes, and the kinds of meaningful conversations that attract a curated, cross-section of industry leaders and innovators with domain experience across healthcare / health-tech ecosystems, academia, NGOs, government, tech, non-profit, as well as media & entertainment - all focused on building the future of healthcare.
The draft agenda for the day:
10:25 - 10:30 am: Welcome, Opening Remarks
· Ajit Verghese, Humble Ventures
10:30 - 11:00 am: The Preemptive Human
· Dr. Felix Olale, MD, PhD - Founder & Chairman, Centio.One
Human biology has always been extraordinarily complex. For centuries, medicine has advanced by observing disease, studying its causes, and slowly learning how the body works. Until recently, much of biology remained difficult to measure continuously or interpret as data. That is beginning to change. Advances in genomics, wearable physiology, multi-omic research, and artificial intelligence are turning the human body into data that can be observed longitudinally and understood in new ways. When these streams of data are integrated, patterns begin to emerge: early signals of risk, subtle biological drift, and the first hints of disease long before symptoms appear. Dr. Felix Olale explores the rise of the “preemptive human,” an era in which healthcare increasingly moves upstream, using predictive biology, genomic insight, and emerging technologies to anticipate risk and preserve health well before disease begins.
11:00 - 11:30 am: From Orbit to Operating Room - BioAstra / medAstra
· Savi Glowe, CEO & Co-Founder
· Eliah Overbey, Chief Science Officer & Co-Founder
BioAstra is building the biomedical bridge between space and Earth. Through astronaut multi-omics research and the development of deployable medical systems, the team translates the constraints of spaceflight into practical healthcare innovation. At SXSW Health Futures House, BioAstra and medAstra will share updates on space genomics and run a live demonstration of their space-derived recovery technology now being used in post-operative care.
11:30 - 12:00 pm: Informed, Empowered, Heard: The Future of Pharmacy and Patient Health Advocacy - Southend Pharmacy
· Haley Collavo, Vice President of Marketing
· Moderator: Gloria Vanderham, Managing Director - Highwire Health
Southend Pharmacy is a state-licensed 503A compounding pharmacy supporting patient-specific care through customized formulations and thoughtful collaboration with healthcare providers. Haley Collavo, VP of Marketing at Southend, will discuss the evolving role of compounding in healthcare in a fireside chat moderated by Gloria Vanderham, Managing Director of Highwire Health. The discussion will explore the gaps many patients face when navigating the healthcare system and how innovation in compounding pharmacies is shaping the future of healthcare.
12:15 - 1:00 pm: Lunch Break, Networking
“IP Scaffold”: Storytelling Architecture for Intellectual Property - Humble Ventures
· Ajit Verghese, Founder, Partner
“IP Scaffold” is a platform that helps patent holders understand, communicate, and monetize their intellectual property. The tool is a new and powerful storytelling engine for Intellectual Property that accelerates go-to-market commercialization and partnership opportunities for IP by translating complex technical data into scientific, business, and market-ready narratives.
1:00 - 1:30 pm: Innovation in Oncology - Oncology Ventures
· Ben Freeberg, Managing Partner, Oncology Ventures
· Leslie Kirk, CEO & Managing Partner
A fireside chat with Ben Freeberg, Partner at Oncology Ventures.
1,700 people die of cancer every day in the U.S., but >1,000 of those deaths could be prevented through earlier detection, guideline-based treatment, better navigation, and data we already possess. During this fireside chat, Ben Freeberg, founder of Oncology Ventures, and Leslie Kirk, CEO of Innsena, will explore the realities and future of cancer care — including costs and complexities, AI innovation, science v systems, and the cancer cures we already have.
1:30 - 2:00 pm: Public Health in the Age of Algorithms
· Nancy Lyon: Director, ACC Bioscience Incubator
· Ashley Cairns: Founder & CEO, Keywell AI
· Elaine Ogden: Senior VP, Precision Strategies
· Moderator: Greg Matthews - Healthquant
The next revolution in public health may not come from a lab—it may come from data. Artificial intelligence, advanced analytics, and new technology platforms are unlocking insights that can help communities detect risks earlier, allocate resources more effectively, and design smarter interventions. This session explores how innovators are using data and AI to build a more responsive, evidence-driven public health system.
2:00 - 2:45 pm: The New Operating System for Healthcare
· Chris Moose: VP Life Sciences, Wheel
· Brian Garsson: CEO, Genesilico AI
· Casey McPherson: Founder and CEO, AlphaRose Therapeutics
· Moderator: Yash Gad - Ringer Sciences
AI, advanced analytics, and digital care platforms are redefining how healthcare works—from finding patients who need help to delivering faster diagnoses and better treatments. By turning fragmented health data into real-time intelligence, new technologies are helping clinicians close care gaps, accelerate discovery, and reach patients wherever they are. This panel examines how innovators are building the next generation of healthcare infrastructure and what it means for the future of patient care.
2:45 - 3:15 pm: The $10M Mistake: Why Digital Health Startups Win Funding But Lose the Market.
· Kirk Barnes, CEO of TransPharMed - TransPharMed
Do you ever see a digital health startup raise millions… then quietly disappear — and wonder what happened? More often than not, it’s not the product that failed — it’s revenue that never scaled. In this talk, I’ll break down the real commercialization gaps that stall growth, why enterprise healthcare selling is fundamentally different, and what founders, VCs, and accelerators must understand to turn innovation into predictable revenue.
3:15 - 3:45 pm: The Patient Is In: How AI Is Shifting Power, Perspective, and Care
· Dr. Pritesh Gandhi — Chief Health Equity & Community Impact Officer, CommonSpirit Health
· Mahesh Sundaresan, VP, AI Cigna
· Moderator: Ganesh Padmanabhan — CEO, Autonomize AI
For decades, healthcare was designed around the system — not the person inside it. That's changing fast.
A new kind of patient is emerging. Informed. Activated. Armed with AI that surfaces information, decodes diagnoses, and demands accountability. They're challenging every assumption the industry has held about who drives decisions in healthcare.
This panel brings together leaders from across the health plan and provider landscape — sharing personal perspectives on what it means to put the patient at the center truly. What happens when the patient becomes the most informed person in the room? And is the industry ready to meet them there?
3:45 - 4:15 pm: Understanding the CMS Health Tech Ecosystem
· Zac Jiwa, CMS
· Moderator: Anastassia Gliadkovskaya, senior writer at Fierce Healthcare
A conversation about the bold initiative led by CMS in partnership with the private sector to move patient access to their data via and empowering 70M Medicare members with modern tools to assist with their care journey through the Medicare.gov App Library
4:15 - 4:45 pm: TBD: A conversation with Joyce Go and Stephen Konya
· Stephen Konya, Chief Innovation & Strategic Partnerships, The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy (ASTP), formerly known as the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC)
4:45 - 5:15 pm: The Future of Healthcare /Health Tech Funding - A fireside chat
· Dr. Denise Brown, MD - AND Capital Ventures
· Shuchi Rana - ServiceNow Ventures
A conversation with Dr. Denise Brown on the state of healthcare funding in 2026 and an outlook on what’s being funded, who is funding, and where the money will look for returns in 2026/27
5:15 - 5:45 pm: It's all about the patient
· Dr. Grace Cordovano, PhD, BCPA - Unblock Health
Ending our day with a reminder of why we all do what we do. It’s all about the patient.
5:45 - 6:00 pm: Closing Remarks
· Ajit Verghese, Humble Ventures