The AI Health Fund launched a new residency program this week called Treehub, which aims to fund early-stage healthcare AI startups coming out of academic labs.
The program will run cohort-based residencies in Los Altos, California. It aims to bridge the gap between research and venture-backed companies by providing funding, mentorship and development infrastructure in the very early stages of a startup — often before the company is even formally created.
Some of the people involved with scouting and mentoring early-stage founders include prominent Silicon Valley figures such as Tim Draper, billionaire founder of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Anne Wojcicki, entrepreneur and co-founder of the beleaguered 23andMe.
The program’s founder, investor and former Google executive Mary Minno, was driven to start Treehub after a personal healthcare experience showed her that the system isn’t designed to reliably keep patients alive, despite the clear dedication of clinicians.
“This started in a deeply personal place. I was postpartum with my second child when I had a family member get really sick, and I got a front row seat at the state of our medical system — and I couldn’t unsee what I had seen,” Minno declared.
She then teamed up with Esther Wojcicki — mother of Anne, as well as anthropologist Janet and the late former YouTube CEO Susan — to launch the residency program, through which they started making investments in October.
Minno noted that Treehub funds startups across three areas: precision outcomes, care efficiency and novel science.
The program now has 12 companies in its portfolio, she said. Some include a stealth company she called “Uber for dermatology;” a stealth brain computer interface startup led by Forest Neurotech co-founder Will Biederman; and Clair Health, which offers noninvasive hormone tracking for women.
“For more than half of our portfolio companies, we introduce the founders to the lawyers that help them incorporate. So when I say we’re early stage, we’re extremely early,” Minno pointed out.
She added that Treehub helps founders with the nuts and bolts of starting a company.
“We help from everything from the day zero things like finding the right co-founders, setting up the entity, and doing all the legal things, all the way through to what we call graduation. Graduation for every company looks different. Some want to raise the big seed round. Some want to join an accelerator. Some have aspirations to deploy across a hospital system,” Minno explained.
While Treehub focuses heavily on early-stage execution, Esther Wojcicki pointed to a more fundamental determinant of success.
To Wojcicki, the most crucial factor determining a startup prosperity isn’t its technical brilliance, but the founders’ ability to work well together.
“Social emotional skills — a lot of these founders don’t have them, I’m sorry to say. And that’s not their fault. It’s more the fault of the system. But we try to help them develop these skills that are really important. How to work with each other is kind of the key. And you look around and see all the companies that have failed, and the main thing that they’ve recently failed at is the founders all started fighting with each other,” she stated.
At Treehub, she focuses on helping founders build these interpersonal skills. Wojcicki also emphasized the importance of humility and adaptability, noting that great founders must be willing to admit when ideas aren’t working and pivot.
She thinks Treehub’s early-stage approach and emphasis on founder development — especially before individuals even see themselves as founders — sets it apart from traditional accelerators.
Minno agreed, saying that by investing so early and focusing on founders rather than fully formed businesses, Treehub can help teams iterate and find viable paths in the right environment. She also noted that, unlike large venture funds that need billion-dollar outcomes, Treehub is comfortable backing companies that become sustainable businesses with more modest exits.
Overall, she sees Treehub’s role as closer to a venture studio — providing hands-on support early on to improve the odds that startups get on the right trajectory.
Photo: Richard Drury, Getty Images
