Startup founders — especially those in a field as complex as health care — may have a great idea or product but not be able to communicate it to investors, or not know how to scale it into a profitable company. That's where Angelica Maestas wants her new venture, HealthTech Rx, to come in.
HealthTech Rx is an organization focused on helping health care technology — or health-tech — startups build to scale through four-week-long ignitor programs. She wants the first cohort of the program to launch this September with a group of 10 startups.
After that first program wraps up, future cohorts would include around 30 startups from New Mexico and across the country. The programs are focused on early-stage startups with at least a minimum viable product, or MVP, Maestas told Albuquerque Busienss First.
It'll cost $3,000 for the four-week program, but Maestas said she's discounting the cost to $2,000 for the first cohort of startups. She wants to use feedback from that cohort to help improve the future, full iterations of the program, which she hopes to run six times per year.
And down the road, Maestas wants to license the program's curriculum to other accelerators and states with more established health care technology hubs, like California, Illinois or Tennessee.
The whole purpose of the program, Maestas said, is to fill a gap in health-tech startup development.
"What I'm seeing … in the New Mexico startups that have reached out already, is that they're very invested in their own startup, they already have an MVP. What they've expressed is that they cannot talk the talk," Maestas said. "That's the value add, to be able to educate them on the lay of the land in health care, the language that we use and position them to really come across as strong in that space.
"Whatever product they're selling, they really need to be able to speak that language," she continued.
The idea for HealthTech Rx came from Maestas' own experience as a health care startup founder. She and co-founder Stefany Goradia launched Versatile MED Analytics, a health care analytics and data automation company, in Albuquerque in 2017.
Another Albuquerque company, RS21, acquired Versatile MED Analytics in early 2021. Maestas then became the leader of RS21's Health Lab, which was formed with the acquisition, alongside Goradia.
Maestas left RS21 in March of this year and announced her startup support organization through a post on the social platform LinkedIn in early June. Prior to founding Versatile MED Analytics, she held positions at large health care organizations including Long Beach, California-based Molina Healthcare and Presbyterian Healthcare Services.
Throughout her career, Maestas said a focus of her work has been supporting underserved businesses. Creating new health-care focused technologies is one specific way to serve those communities in the health care field, she said.
"I know that the path to innovation in health care is going to be health technology — there is no way around it," Maestas said. "That is how we are going to change how care is delivered and how care can be delivered equitably to underserved populations."
Besides supporting health-tech startups through the ignitor programs, she said she's also working with venture capital funds to get an idea of what they seek in investable startup companies to potentially boost their deal flow. Maestas also hopes to offer what she referred to as "ad-hoc advisory services" through HealthTech Rx, as well.
A team of advisors has helped Maestas shape what the ignitor programs could look like, including the ideal number of startups to include and what resources to offer, she said. The programs will be run virtually and sessions will be recorded, Maestas said, adding that she hopes to offer in-person events to culminate each four-week cohort.
Finding a network of startup founders within those cohorts is another focus of the programs, she added.
"Entrepreneurship is one of the loneliest and most vulnerable experiences," Maestas said. "Having a community of those who are living it with you — that's important. I'm looking forward to building that in each cohort."
Maestas said she's finalizing startups for the inaugural ignitor program cohort, which she wants to launch in September.
