BetterDoctor office visit with Ari Tulla: A focus on execution

I got an invite out of the blue today to attend a 500 Startups Digital Health field trip to BetterDoctor. One of the key advantages to have an office in San Francisco is proximity to opportunities like these. Located in the SOMA district, BetterDoctor is a high impact portfolio company of 500 Startups. It was a pleasure hearing Co-Founder and CEO Ari Tulla's take on healthcare and where BetterDoctor is heading.

BetterDoctor: My Takeaways from Ari Tulla

Here are my takeaways from our office visit with Ari Tulla:

• Recently closed their Series B round.
• Healthcare data is hidden in silos, access is hard to get.
• BetterDoctor is about collecting data from providers and making it useful to the end user.
• About three years ago, it was impossible to create an accurate database of healthcare consumer info.
• 25M people have used BetterDoctor to find a doctor.
• Nobody in the market has data that's 75% or more accurate on just name, address, and phone numbers of doctors.
• "We become the data hub for the healthcare provider."
• BetterDoctor Value Proposition: Offering compliance, ease of use and lower cost.
• Provider data is a $10B market.
• Every quarter they ping doctors to update data.
• "You need to still use the fax because it's the only way people (doctors) react."
• "I started the company to help people find doctors."
• Focused on execution.
• "Most of the products today in the marketplace don't work."
• "How do you prove the ROI?" (Can be tough to do in healthcare)
• Pilot is a dirty word. Proof of concept is way better.
• Price 40% higher in the initial quote.
• Try to avoid the RFP process with big companies. You're setup to fail. They are often written by your competition.
• "Don't save on legal fees on big deals."
• The consumer business model is almost dead in healthcare.
• Healthcare is much slower than other verticals.

About 500 Startups Digital Health 

500 Startups Digital Health is part of the four month core accelerator program focused on customer acquisition and fundraising. They look for tech-enabled health and health care startups who have a product in the hands of some customers, but need to scale traction before qualifying for a follow on round. We are pleased to say we were part of their first batch (B18).

About BetterDoctor

BetterDoctor helps patients find the right doctors when they need them. It starts with helping health plans, provider groups, health care systems and health start up companies get high quality data. They build tools to bring trust, confidence, and transparency to the process of finding a doctor. 500 Startups was one of their early investors in 2012.