In short order, startup incubator Rock Health has become one of the Bay Area’s hubs for entrepreneurs working on technology ideas that could change healthcare delivery.
Formed last year to test whether the startup accelerator model pioneered by organizations like Y Combinator and TechStars will work in the healthcare industry, Rock Health has already graduated its first class of 13 startups and assembled a high-powered group of entrepreneurs, investors, and other advisors to mentor the early-stage companies in its network. (A second group of startups enters the program this month.)
Rock Health drew on this community to fill a banquet hall at Farallon in downtown San Francisco this Sunday, on the cusp of the annual JP Morgan Healthcare conference, which draws much the leadership of the U.S. biotech and pharmaceutical communities. Loosely designed to recognize the 50 leading influencers in digital health, the dinner also served as a prime networking opportunity—and, for some entrepreneurs, a chance to show off their wares. AliveCor chief medical officer David Albert, for example, gave live demonstrations the company’s portable cardiac monitor, which is built into an iPhone case (see the third image in our slide show below).
“We organized the event to recognize and celebrate the leaders making things happen in digital health,” says Leslie Ziegler, creative director at Rock Health. “We hope the format of the evening allowed these diverse minds to talk freely about the future of the space, meet and support newcomers, and find new ways to collaborate.”
San Francisco-based photographer Toni Gauthier was on hand to document the event, and Rock Health has shared some of the resulting images with Xconomy, which was a media sponsor of the event. The dinner’s main supporters were Rock Health partners Silicon Valley Bank and Fenwick & West.
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| L to R: Michael Esquivel (Fenwick & West), Leslie Ziegler (Rock Health), Jackson Wilkinson (WeSprout).
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| Photo by Toni Gauthier |
