Crowdfunding Health Innovation: Disruptive Companies And Funders Meet To Change Health Delivery

Nicole Fisher | Forbes Magazine | February 24, 2014

Two of the most significant pieces of legislation in decades, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act, are poised to transform the entire spectrum of health care. The ACA regulates everything from health insurance requirements to tax collection. The JOBS Act regulates businesses that fund their ventures online. In tandem, these two bills have created a new world for health care innovators and investors. Ironically though, it is the innovators and investors who are joining forces to do what the ACA is unable to do: reduce costs and increase access. At the 7th Annual OneMedForum recently in San Francisco more than 400 one-on-one investor meetings were conducted between venture capitalists and startup health care companies, all in the name of disruptive innovation.

The OneMedForum was held in unison with the JP Morgan Conference, aimed at bringing thought leaders, reformers and financiers together to change the delivery of health care. Change that is desperately needed based on Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that federal spending for the major health care programs and Social Security would increase to a total of 14% of GDP by 2038, twice the 7% average of the past 40 years.

The creators of the programming believe that disruptive innovation is the key component to reshaping the future of health care. They have faith that raising capital online post-JOBS Act will flourish, and that crowdfunding and secondary markets is the fastest way to create smarter clinical trials, personalized medicine and allow private companies to go public.