OSF Ventures, the corporate investment arm of OSF HealthCare, is joining other health care systems and strategic investors from within the healthcare industry as a limited partner in Boston-based LRVHealth.
As part of LRVHealth’s collaborative innovation platform, which represents a network that delivers care to 50 million Americans across 25 states, OSF will help identify, create and invest in early-stage companies spanning healthcare IT, tech-enabled health services, medical devices, and diagnostics.
As a strategic investor in LRVHealth’s fourth fund, OSF HealthCare will benefit from access to early-stage companies that have been identified and vetted through a vast network that reaches across the healthcare continuum in the U.S. These companies are often in the initial phases of developing solutions to enhance patient experiences, improve outcomes, and reduce costs.
“Tapping into this network will help augment our portfolio with companies at an earlier stage of development than we focus on with direct investments,” says Stan Lynall, vice president of OSF Venture Investments.
OSF Ventures continues to seek direct investment opportunities with medical startups at mid-stage development around the U.S. It also partners with incubators, accelerators, and universities to help develop, test, pilot, and implement solutions throughout the health care system.
This is OSF’s second limited partner investment in a venture capital fund managed outside of the organisation. In December of 2016, OSF Ventures announced a limited partner investment in Ascension Ventures. The subsidiary of the nation’s largest Catholic and nonprofit health system researches hundreds of health care companies annually for possible investment and shares similar values and focus as OSF HealthCare.
Likewise, LRVHealth focuses on investment themes that align with OSF’s beliefs about certain industry realities, including the gradual shift to value-based care and the importance of new technologies to enable that transformation.
“Consumerism in healthcare is quickly evolving and consumers are demanding a different experience from their health care providers,” Lynall adds. “As another set of eyes and ears that’s looking for the best innovation in the digital health ecosystem, LRVHealth will enable us to be ahead of the curve in meeting and exceeding these new expectations.”
The investment in ways to reduce health care costs is also aligned with OSF HealthCare’s mission. “We invested in LRVHealth because its team truly believes reducing cost is tremendously important for clinical providers to remain financially viable and able to serve their communities,” says Lynall.
“All of the health systems within the LRVHealth network are forward-looking organizations that are focused on identifying and nurturing innovation to help address the healthcare industry’s largest challenges – and OSF fits that mould perfectly,” says Tripp Peake, general partner at LRVHealth. “OSF HealthCare is recognised as a top-rated US system overall and Becker’s Hospital Review has identified OSF as a leader in healthcare system innovation programs. Partnering closely with the OSF Ventures and OSF Innovation teams gives our network another conduit to people who understand the healthcare system best and are already looking for impactful ways to improve care and control costs.”
LRVHealth’s strategic investors now include 11 health care systems and the Innovation Institute, a for-profit venture owned by six non-profit hospital systems that operate in 20 states. The institute invests in and incubates healthcare startups, connecting them with doctors and other healthcare companies.
Additionally, LRVHealth has attracted a distinguished group of advisors consisting of entrepreneurs, health care executives, leading clinicians, policy experts, and other industry insiders. Most recently, the firm welcomed former ONC chief and assistant secretary at HHS, Dr. Karen DeSalvo, to its team of executive advisors.
Lynall says: “The firm has compiled a team and network that reaches all corners of the healthcare system. Being able to call on experts in a given area at any time gives us extreme confidence in LRVHealth’s ability to find and nurture the most promising young digital health startups.”
