The US alone went from $4.5bn in 2016 to $8.1bn in 2018- almost doubled in two years, especially in digital healthcare.

Senior executives and funders representing Israeli VCs Alon MedTech and Pitango, America’s Partners Healthcare, Polaris Partners and Bourne Partners, shared market specific insights of healthcare investment. The US alone went from $4.5bn in 2016 to $8.1bn in 2018- almost doubled in two years, especially in digital healthcare. Asia and digital health have dominant places in terms of healthcare investment, which all VCs agreed not to be neglected globally.

Trung Do, Vice President in charge of business development for Partners Healthcare, suggested that healthcare providers may think strategically about bridging gaps between medical innovation and commercialisation. It is apparently a trend that IT companies work alongside medical institutes, such as Google and Mayo, Partners itself has allied with NVIDIA, Dell and GE Healthcare, he commented.

Shimon Eckhouse, who established Alon MedTech Ventures and well-known as a health tech serial entrepreneur, noted that healthcare startups normally fundraised $70 million in a ten-year span and that amount can be taken as an indicator for those who wish to start off their business. Nevertheless, he added, in Israel startups accounted for merely 12% of VC’s funding, which is akin to Taiwan. Dr Eckhouse also shared a golden rule for startups to be successful, which is ‘TIME (Timing, Innovation, Market, Execution)’.

Amir Nashat from Polaris Partners, who has been named to the Forbes Midas List of “Top 100 Venture Capitalists”, echoed that increasingly tech companies allocate resources for healthcare, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, for example. Biotech development in Asia remains vigorous, judging by AstraZeneca, Biogen and Amgen’s investment and presence in China. It is to say that Asia will continue to play a key role in biotech, he concluded.  

Guy Ezekiel, Managing General Partner Pitango, pointed that trends of global heatlhcare investment to watch out for would be AI implementation, genomic technology & data application, bioprinting technology, and telemedicine- all that simply falls under digital health. Digital health will impact wider healthcare industries, even the healthcare by definition, ranging from pharmaceutical R&D, medical data application to well-being.

Banks Bourne, Bourne Partners Founder and CEO, observed that the US market has been enthusiastic about over-the-counter drugs (OCT) and consumer health, coupled with a trend on pharma services outsourcing as certain services no longer present value for money. Asia becomes a driving force to have shaped what the US trends are today, he reiterated.