A new startup seed-accelerator, Rock Health, wants to give you $20,000, no strings attached, along with mentorship and office space for five months, in order to turn your health-related startup or idea into a reality. Supported by some serious names (see below), Rock Health aims to catalyze software-based innovation in the health sector. They’re structured as a non-profit, and are opening doors to their first startup class this June.
Rock Health has been getting a lot of interest as of late, so we recently ran into founder Halle Tecco out in San Francisco. When congratulating her about the buzz for the incubator she said “we’re getting attention because this is long, long overdue in health care.” She and her team are looking for early stage, software-based startups that want to transform health care, but the incubator purposely don’t require any health related experience of their applicants.
From the press release:
“Health care is the most important challenge facing our nation, yet patient care and healthy living do not yet exhibit the technological creativity found in social media, games and other verticals,” adds Rock Health’s medical director, Nate Gross. “Physicians are excited to work with our developers because they recognize that product design should not be an afterthought.”
Rock Health is building a diverse advisor and mentor community with experts from design, data science, gaming and health care IT. Rock Health’s advisory board includes Frank Moss, head of the New Media Medicine group at the MIT Media Lab, and Michael Abbott, VP of Engineering at Twitter. Startup mentors include Charles Huang, co-founder of GuitarHero, and Linda Avey, co-founder of 23andMe.
Medicine, to many entrepreneurs, is a minefield of HIPPA regulations, clinical trials, and fragmented data standards, therefore we’re excited to see resources like Rock Health that encourage enterprising folks to take the plunge into health care.
So, if you’ve got an idea that you’d like to bake in the arms of $20,000 and get help from the Innovation Center at Mayo Clinic, apply before May 13th.
Link: Rock Health
Press release (.pdf): Rock Health Launches…