Cd
Winner · 2025
Care Delivery · Cardiology
Cardia Health
Heart-failure management for risk-bearing primary care. Live in 11 hospital systems. Reduces 30-day readmissions by 34% in the published RCT.
2025 · RecapYale Club, NYC · Nov 2–3, 2025
One million dollars, one room. Forty-eight hours.
Five companies pitched. Eight judges deliberated until 2am. By breakfast Sunday, the cheque was on the table. Here’s what happened, who won, and what the room is doing twelve months later.
01 /Recap
Six minutes in the room.
A short film cut from 14 hours of footage by Field Notes. The pitches, the deliberation room, the moment Cardia’s Sarah Yoon learned she’d won.
00:00 — 01:12The arrivalsYale Club lobby, Saturday
01:12 — 03:24The five pitchesStage A · Day One
03:24 — 05:08The deliberationLibrary, behind glass
05:08 — 06:22The chequeSunday morning
02 /Impact
What $1M turned into.
Twelve months after the cheque cleared. Numbers verified by GHF; raised totals confirmed by founders and lead investors as of October 2026.
Applications received847
From 34 countries; reviewed by all 22 judges. 89% read by the panel themselves — not by associates.
Follow-on capital raised$112M
Across the cohort of five, in the twelve months following the event. Lead rounds from a16z, Andreessen Bio, Foresite, and 7wire.
Patients reached2.4M
Across the five portfolio companies. Counts only patients who used the product, not impressions.
Hospital systems deployed38
Live, paying customers — not pilots. Includes Cleveland Clinic, Kaiser, Mayo, Mount Sinai, and Geisinger.
Median valuation lift3.8×
From entry round to most recent priced round. Trailing twelve months, cohort median.
Jobs created in cohort421
Net headcount growth across the five portfolio companies. 64% are clinical or operational; 36% engineering.
03 /Cohort
The five who made it to the stage.
Selected from 847 applications by the panel of eight. Each one ran through three sector interviews, two diligence calls, and the final pitch.
Ax
Provider Ops · Workflow AI
Axon Notes
Ambient documentation purpose-built for surgical specialties. 8,400 surgeons live; integrated into Epic and Cerner.
Mr
Biotech · Diagnostics
Marrow Bio
At-home blood diagnostic for hematologic malignancies. CLIA-certified; 14,000 tests run; first commercial deployment with Memorial Sloan Kettering.
Ev
Digital Health · Mental Health
Even Health
Group therapy at scale, employer-paid. 240,000 covered lives across 22 self-insured employers. Engagement: 41% MAU.
Pl
Payor · VBC Infrastructure
Plinth Payments
VBC contract management infrastructure for ACOs and risk-bearing groups. $14B in attributed lives runs through Plinth's reconciliation engine.
04 /Stages
Five pitches. Seven hundred minutes.
The order, the moment that mattered, the scoreline. Each founder had 12 minutes to pitch and 18 to take questions. The room kept the timer.
10:14 ESTSat · Pitch 1
Care Delivery · Cardiology
Cardia Health — heart failure as a risk-bearing service
Sarah Yoon, CEO & co-founder
“We're not a tool you bolt onto a primary-care practice. We're the cardiology line item on their capitated P&L.”
Advanced
9.1 / 10 panel score
11:08 ESTSat · Pitch 2
Provider Ops · Workflow AI
Axon Notes — ambient documentation for the OR
Naveen Patel, CEO & co-founder
“Every other ambient tool is built for the clinic. The OR is a different problem — and ours is the only product surgeons actually keep on after the pilot ends.”
Finalist
8.4 / 10 panel score
13:42 ESTSat · Pitch 3
Biotech · Diagnostics
Marrow Bio — at-home hematologic dx
Dr. Lily Chen, CEO & chief scientist
“You can find leukemia from a finger-prick if you have the right assay. We have the right assay. The remaining problem is logistics, and that's a problem we love.”
Finalist
8.2 / 10 panel score
15:18 ESTSat · Pitch 4
Digital Health · Mental Health
Even Health — group therapy at scale
Marcus Hill, CEO & co-founder
“1:1 therapy isn't scarce because there aren't enough therapists. It's scarce because the unit isn't built for the work. The unit should be a group of eight.”
Finalist
7.9 / 10 panel score
16:32 ESTSat · Pitch 5
Payor · VBC Infrastructure
Plinth Payments — the reconciliation engine for VBC
Anya Petrova, CEO & co-founder
“Risk contracts get signed. Then nobody actually figures out what each side owes. That's a $14B reconciliation problem and we solved it.”
Finalist
8.0 / 10 panel score
05 /Network
The investors in the lobby.
Twenty-eight firms attended in person. Eleven of them led or co-led a follow-on round in a Venture Forum 2025 cohort company within twelve months.
Andreessen Horowitz
Bio + Health · Menlo Park2Cohort follow-ons
General Catalyst
Health · Boston · NYC3Cohort follow-ons
Foresite Capital
Bio + Dx · SF1Lead · Marrow
7wireVentures
Digital Health · Chicago1Lead · Cardia
Optum Ventures
Strategic · Eden Prairie1Strategic · Plinth
Lux Capital
Frontier · NYC1Co-led · Axon
F-Prime Capital
Healthcare · Boston1Co-led · Marrow
Lightspeed Health
Digital + Bio · SF1Co-led · Even
Bessemer Venture Partners
Healthcare · NYC—In room · 2025
Khosla Ventures
Bio + AI · Menlo Park—In room · 2025
Polaris Partners
Healthcare · Boston—In room · 2025
Define Ventures
Digital Health · SF—In room · 2025
06 /Candid
Forty-eight hours, in pictures.
Photos by Field Notes. The lobby, the library, the cheque. Real headshots and frames will replace these placeholder cells when the gallery opens.
The cheque, Sun morning · 09:14
Library deliberation · Sat 23:48
Stage A · Cardia
Anya Petrova, backstage
Lobby · Sat 14:00
Coffee, Sun 06:30
Stage B · Marrow
Yale Club exterior
Panel debrief · Sun 11:00
Sarah Yoon, accepting
07 /Pulse
What the press said.
Coverage selected for substance, not flattery. The full press archive lives in the GHF newsroom; the six below are the pieces we keep coming back to.
STAT NewsNov 4, 2025
“At Yale Club, an unusually quiet healthcare pitch competition places its million on cardiology.”
Read · 6 min →Axios Pro RataNov 5, 2025“GHF’s Venture Forum becomes the most-watched pitch event in healthcare. The reason is the panel.”
Read · 4 min →Endpoints NewsNov 7, 2025“The bio finalist nobody saw coming: Marrow’s at-home assay clears MSK pilot in record time.”
Read · 8 min →The InformationDec 12, 2025“How Sarah Yoon turned $1M of grant capital into a $240M valuation in eight months.”
Read · 12 min →The GeneralistFeb 18, 2026“Why the Venture Forum cohort outperformed every accelerator class of 2025.”
Read · 10 min →Modern HealthcareMay 6, 2026“Six months in: Cardia Health is signed across eleven systems and renegotiating its lead round.”
Read · 7 min →08 /Growth
Twelve months later. Where they are.
Reported by founders; verified by lead investors. The cohort doesn’t grade itself — these are real numbers as of October 2026.
Cd
Cardia Health Sep 2026
Series B closed at $240M led by 7wire and General Catalyst.
Eleven hospital systems live; two more in security review. RCT data published in JAMA Cardiology shows 34% reduction in 30-day readmissions across attributed lives.
$240MValuation
11Health systems
+38Headcount
Ax
Axon Notes Aug 2026
Series A extension led by Lux; Epic certification cleared.
Live with 8,400 surgeons across 22 systems. Net revenue retention at 142%. The Epic App Orchard listing went live in July.
$180MValuation
8.4kActive users
142%NRR
Mr
Marrow Bio Oct 2026
FDA breakthrough designation; Series B led by Foresite + F-Prime.
14,000 tests run; CLIA-certified across two reference labs. First commercial deployment with MSK closed; Mayo deployment scheduled for Q1.
$310MValuation
14kTests run
FDABreakthrough
Ev
Even Health Jul 2026
Series A closed at $95M led by Lightspeed Health.
240k covered lives across 22 self-insured employers. 41% MAU is the highest engagement number in the digital mental health category, per Rock Health's 2026 benchmark.
$95MValuation
240kCovered lives
41%MAU
Pl
Plinth Payments Jun 2026
Series A closed; Optum strategic round on top.
$14B in attributed lives runs through Plinth. Strategic round signals Optum's intent to standardize on the Plinth reconciliation API across its risk-bearing groups.
$140MValuation
$14BLives admin'd
OptumStrategic
★
Cohort aggregate Oct 2026
$112M raised, 421 jobs created, 2.4M patients reached.
Reported quarterly to GHF and aggregated against the public Venture Forum scorecard. Median valuation lift across the five companies is 3.8× from entry to most recent round.
$112MFollow-on
421Jobs
2.4MPatients