Apr 11, 2024
Because Nashville has crushed us. They have In-N-Out Burger. And a $68 billion healthcare industry.
Render is physically located in NuLu adjacent to the Louisville Medical and Educational District [LOUMED]. One of the services we provide is facilitating corporate innovation—helping companies work with and like startups. Innovation as a Service. And Render Capital, the other side of the house manages the only institutionally backed venture capital fund in Kentucky.
“Within the last 10 years, a growing number of health systems have set up innovation centers, with at least 110 in the United States,” according to a 2022 publication by Onil Bhattacharyya, MD, PhD et al. According to Becker's Healthcare, however, no hospital or health system in Kentucky has an innovation program.
At least 23 health systems in the U.S. have Corporate Venture Capital arms that represent billions of dollars in deployable capital in healthcare/health system innovation. But none are in Kentucky, according to Becker’s Healthcare.
LOUMED has been home to healthcare innovations in the past. For example, the first hand transplant surgery in the U.S. was performed at Jewish Hospital in 1999 by Dr. Warren C. Breidenbach, a hand surgeon with Kleinert, Kutz and Associates Hand Care Center and assistant clinical professor of surgery at the University of Louisville. In 2001, the world's first implantation of Abiomed, Inc.'s AbioCor Implantable Replacement Heart was done at Jewish Hospital.
The LOUMED district is comprised of 22 city blocks, 250 acres and 9.6 million square feet of occupied space in the heart of downtown. It operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. LOUMED institutions employ over 16,000 people. Two of the top five largest employers in Louisville are anchored in LOUMED. Density is important in building, growing, and nurturing an ecosystem of any kind. It is the heartbeat of the city. And a massive economic engine for Louisville.
But there currently is no unified healthcare focused innovation center.
A 2015 survey by The Commonwealth Fund defined healthcare innovation centers “as places that are working to discover, develop, test, and/or spread new models of care delivery—in hospitals, clinics, and patients’ homes.”
Peer medical centers have both innovation programs and investment arms:
- Multiple members of Boston’s Longwood Medical and Academic Area (Boston Children’s Innovation and Digital Health Accelerator, Brigham Digital Innovation Hub, Binney Street Capital, etc.)
- Texas Medical Center in Houston (TMC Innovation, TMC Venture Fund)
- Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus (Innovation Community).
Louisville had the second lowest startup business employment of peer cities from 2017-2022, according to Louisville Metro Department of Economic Development. The strategic plan references venture capital data from Dealroom, noting Louisville trails its peers and aspirational competitors in venture capital investment levels.
Could a LOUMED-affiliated innovation program increase quality healthcare deal flow by spurring healthcare innovation?
By increasing quality healthcare deal flow, could Louisville attract more venture capital?
Perhaps, if we fish in the right sea, among other things.
Research has shown that, contrary to popular thinking, the best entrepreneurs tend to be middle-aged. The mean founder age for the 1 in 1,000 highest growth new ventures is 45. Founders with three or more years of experience in the same industry as their startup are twice as likely to have a one-in-1,000 fastest-growing company. LOUMED institutions employ over 16,000 people. What if an innovation program worked to identify and support middle-aged LOUMED employees with career experience to participate in healthcare innovation?
Fish in the right sea to increase quality healthcare deal flow.
Customers, capital, and talent (the three things needed to grow any company) exist but they need to be activated.
To be clear, let’s not focus on sub-sectors such as biotechnology that have large capital consumption restraints, regulatory burdens and decades to liquidity or impact. Rather, ideation around care coordination, patient engagement and access, workflow efficiencies, population health, value-based care models and the like.
What strategies and sources would an innovation center use to identify potential innovations? How would an innovation center facilitate the piloting of innovative solutions? What type of programming would attract the healthcare industry in the Louisville area downtown to “the heartbeat of the city?” Answers to these questions are squarely in Render’s wheelhouse.
Creating an atmosphere and structure with density to support healthcare innovation would revitalize and reinforce the image and identity of LOUMED as the region’s primary medical and educational district. What Louisville lacks in sensational fast food chains, it could make up for in innovation - and bourbon.
