Digital health startups raised roughly $4.0 billion across 110 deals in the first quarter of 2026, the strongest first quarter since the pandemic peak.
Twelve deals were $100 million or more, capturing 59% of the total capital raised.[1]
Capital is concentrating, and almost all of it is funding artificial intelligence (AI): Rock Health stopped reporting AI and non-AI startups separately this year, on the logic that nearly every digital health company is now AI-enabled. In many ways this reminds me of the adoption of "tech companies" where eventually all companies used computers and "tech".
How this list is built (and what it deliberately leaves out)
Ranked by dedicated healthcare fund size. Where a firm runs a healthcare-specific vehicle, that fund's most recent close is the ranking number. Important to note it is possible I may have missed a fund.
Generalist giants are listed separately, not ranked. Sequoia, Lightspeed, Founders Fund, Khosla, Bessemer, GV, NEA, and Lux are among the most important health-AI investors alive, but they deploy from multibillion-dollar generalist funds with no healthcare-only vehicle, so there is no apples-to-apples "health fund" to rank. They get their own section below.
Pure biotech and life-sciences megafunds are a different lane. OrbiMed, Bain Capital Life Sciences, and F-Prime command larger healthcare pools, but their capital flows mainly into drug discovery and therapeutics rather than the care-delivery software and clinical AI that touch a working practice. Noted at the end, not ranked here.
Each firm also gets a concierge read. For NextMD's audience of physician-led concierge and DPC practices, every entry flags the one portfolio company most worth a small practice's attention.
The Ranking
# | Firm | HQ | Dedicated healthcare fund | Flagship health-AI bet | Concierge relevance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Oak HC/FT | Greenwich, CT | $1.94B (Fund V, 2024)¹ | Ambience Healthcare | High |
2 | a16z Bio + Health | Menlo Park, CA | $1.5B (Bio Fund IV, 2022)² | Hippocratic AI | High |
3 | Foresite Capital | San Francisco | $900M (Fund VI, 2024)³ | Thyme Care | Med |
4 | Transformation Capital | Boston | $800M (Fund III) | Rad AI | Med |
5 | General Catalyst | Cambridge, MA | $750M health allocation (2024)⁴ | Commure | High |
6 | Define Ventures | San Francisco | $460M (Funds III + Opps, 2023) | Layer Health | Med-High |
7 | Town Hall Ventures | New York City | $440M (Fund IV, 2025) | Cityblock Health | Low-Med |
8 | Frist Cressey Ventures | Nashville, TN | $425M (Fund IV, 2026) | One to One Health | Med-High |
9 | Flare Capital Partners | Boston | $350M (Fund III, 2022) | HealthVerity | Low |
10 | 7wireVentures | Chicago | $217M (Growth & Opportunity Fund) | Transcarent | Med |
¹ Oak's Fund V is a combined healthcare-and-fintech vehicle. ² a16z's most recent dedicated bio + health raise was $700M (2026); Bio Fund IV ($1.5B, 2022) remains its largest dedicated health vehicle. ³ Foresite spans healthcare and life sciences, so part of the fund is biotech. ⁴ General Catalyst's $750M is the healthcare carve-out of its $8B 2024 platform; its prior dedicated Health Assurance Fund II closed at $670M (2022).
The 10 Firms
1. Oak HC/FT: $1.94B (Fund V, 2024)
The largest dedicated healthcare-and-fintech fund among pure specialists.[2] Annie Lamont co-founded the firm in 2014; Allen Miller leads many recent healthcare deals.
Flagship health-AI bet: Ambience Healthcare. Oak co-led Ambience's $243 million Series C in July 2025 at a $1.25 billion valuation, alongside a16z. Ambience is an ambient AI scribe with coding-aware documentation across more than 100 specialties.[3]
For a practice: High relevance. A concierge physician running 30-to-60-minute visits can save 60 to 90 minutes of charting a day with an ambient scribe. Ambience and Abridge are the two most polished options as of 2026.
2. a16z Bio + Health: $1.5B (Bio Fund IV, 2022)
Andreessen Horowitz runs the largest dedicated bio + health practice in venture, with Bio Fund IV at $1.5 billion and a fresh $700 million bio + health raise in 2026.[4] Julie Yoo leads healthcare services; Vineeta Agarwala MD PhD runs the broader portfolio.
Flagship health-AI bet: Hippocratic AI. A generative-AI nurse-agent platform that runs pre-visit intake, post-discharge follow-up, chronic-care check-ins, and medication-reconciliation calls. It raised a $126 million Series C at a $3.5 billion valuation in November 2025.[5] a16z also backs Abridge and co-led Ambience.
For a practice: High relevance. Concierge practices already promise 24/7 access and frequent check-ins; a safe AI voice agent delivers on that without adding staff.
3. Foresite Capital: $900M (Fund VI, 2024)
A multi-stage healthcare and life-sciences firm with more than $3.5 billion under management; Fund VI closed at $900 million in June 2024.[6] Part of the fund is biotech, which is why its concierge relevance is lower than its size suggests.
Flagship health-AI bet: Thyme Care. An AI-enabled, value-based cancer-care navigation platform. Foresite co-led an earlier round and stayed in for the $97 million Series D in September 2025, which crossed a $1 billion valuation.[7]
For a practice: Medium. A referral path for the cancer patients a concierge or DPC practice cannot fully shepherd alone; Thyme Care handles navigation and symptom triage between oncology appointments.
4. Transformation Capital: $800M (Fund III)
A Boston growth-stage firm dedicated entirely to digital health, with Fund III at $800 million.[8] One of the most concierge-aware large allocators on this list.
Flagship health-AI bet: Rad AI. Transformation led Rad AI's $60 million Series C in January 2025 at a $525 million valuation. Rad AI auto-drafts radiology impressions and cuts read time.[9]
For a practice: Medium, mostly downstream. When you order imaging at a partner radiology group running Rad AI, turnaround is faster and reads are more consistent.
5. General Catalyst: $750M healthcare allocation (2024)
Arguably the most healthcare-native major firm, even though its health capital sits inside a larger platform: a $750 million healthcare allocation within its $8 billion 2024 raise, on top of the $670 million Health Assurance Fund II (2022).[10] Hemant Taneja co-founded Livongo, Commure, and Transcarent and increasingly builds healthcare companies rather than just funding them.
Flagship health-AI bet: Commure. An AI ambient scribe, EHR layer, and revenue-cycle suite. Commure raised $70 million at a $7 billion valuation in May 2026, led by General Catalyst with Sequoia and Morgan Stanley, bringing its total to $750 million.[11]
For a practice: High relevance, especially if you want one vendor running scribe plus billing instead of three.
6. Define Ventures: $460M (Funds III + Opportunities, 2023)
One of the few firms investing only in early-stage digital health, with roughly $800 million under management.[12] Founded by Lynne Chou O'Keefe, formerly of Kleiner Perkins.
Flagship health-AI bet: Layer Health. A Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) spin-out using large language models to automate clinical chart review. Define led its $21 million Series A in March 2025, with GV participating.[13]
For a practice: Medium-high. For a new concierge patient transferring records from a previous primary care provider, an AI chart summary turns hours of digging into a one-page read before the first visit.
7. Town Hall Ventures: $440M (Fund IV, 2025)
Andy Slavitt's firm (he ran the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) raised a $440 million Fund IV in 2025, explicitly to back founders using AI as a core capability for underserved populations.[14]
Flagship health-AI bet: Cityblock Health. A value-based care provider for Medicaid and dually eligible members that uses AI to automate assessments and member outreach.[15]
For a practice: Low-to-medium for cash-pay concierge specifically (the population is different), but the clearest example of AI being used to stretch a care team, which is the same problem a small practice faces.
8. Frist Cressey Ventures: $425M (Fund IV, 2026)
Founded in 2016 by former Senate Majority Leader and transplant surgeon Bill Frist and Bryan Cressey, this Nashville firm closed an oversubscribed $425 million Fund IV in February 2026, dedicated to early-stage, AI-native care-delivery companies.[16] Its strategic limited partners are health systems covering more than half the U.S. population.
Flagship health-AI bet: One to One Health. A $12 million Frist Cressey investment to scale an AI-enabled primary care model.[17]
For a practice: Medium-high. Frist Cressey funds the AI-native care-delivery and physician-enablement models closest to how concierge and DPC practices actually operate, and its health-system network is a useful read on where care delivery is heading.
9. Flare Capital Partners: $350M (Fund III, 2022)
A dedicated healthtech specialist with a 30-year track record and roughly $1 billion under management; Fund III closed at $350 million.[18]
Flagship health-AI bet: HealthVerity. A real-world healthcare and consumer-data platform; Flare also backed real-world-evidence company Aetion, which exited in 2025.[19]
For a practice: Low directly. Flare's strength is health-data and clinical-AI infrastructure, which reaches practices through the vendors built on top of it rather than as a tool you license.
10. 7wireVentures: $217M (Growth & Opportunity Fund)
Small but the most explicitly concierge-aligned firm on the list.[20] Glen Tullman, founder of Livongo and CEO of Transcarent, is co-managing partner.
Flagship health-AI bet: Transcarent. An AI health-navigation platform that triages benefits, routes members to the right specialist or virtual visit, and bundles care episodes into a single pre-paid price.
For a practice: Medium. For practices that take employer contracts, Transcarent is the routing layer that delivers patients pre-qualified, with benefits and payment cleared.
The Generalist Giants (Not Ranked, but Don't Ignore Them)
These firms fund as much health AI as anyone on the ranked list, but they invest from huge generalist funds with no dedicated healthcare vehicle, so there is no "health fund size" to rank them by. They are too important to leave out:
Sequoia Capital. Led OpenEvidence's first institutional round and led Freed's Series A, the AI scribe built for independent and small practices.
Lightspeed Venture Partners. Closed $9 billion-plus across six funds in December 2025; led Neko Health's $260 million Series B (AI preventive full-body scanning) and backs Abridge.
Founders Fund. Backs Freenome, the multi-cancer early-detection test going public via a 2026 SPAC (special purpose acquisition company).
Khosla Ventures. Curai Health, plus stakes in Abridge and Sword Health.
Bessemer Venture Partners. The early Abridge backer; took Hinge Health public in May 2025.
GV (Google Ventures). Led OpenEvidence's 2025 rounds; the company hit a $12 billion valuation in January 2026 and is used by a large portion of all U.S. physicians.
NEA. Long-term backer of Tempus AI (precision oncology, now public).
Lux Capital. Recursion and EvolutionaryScale (AI drug discovery and protein design).
If you want the single easiest AI tool to try this week, it comes from this group: OpenEvidence is free for licensed physicians and answers clinical questions with cited sources in seconds.
A Different Lane: The Big Life-Sciences Funds
Three firms command larger healthcare pools than anyone above, but their capital is mostly therapeutics and biotech, not care-delivery software: OrbiMed (roughly $17 billion under management), Bain Capital Life Sciences, and F-Prime Capital (about $4.5 billion in healthcare and life-sciences assets; its real health-AI bet is the workflow-automation platform Notable). They matter for the drugs of the next decade more than the tools in your exam room this year.
What This Means for Your Practice
A traditional primary care physician with a 2,000-to-2,500 patient panel and 13-to-16-minute visits cannot use many of these tools well.[21] There is no time to review pre-visit AI summaries or interpret a screen. Concierge medicine and DPC are the opposite: panels under 300, visits of 30 to 60 minutes, roughly 4 to 6 patients a day.[21] DPC physicians typically stay under 800 patients and charge $50 to $200 per month.[21] That schedule has the slack to actually use AI tools, so the return per tool is higher in a concierge setting than almost anywhere else in primary care.
This is the same panel-size math behind Why Concierge Medicine Patients Visit the ER 40% Less Often. For the industry-wide picture of how capital is reshaping ownership and pricing, see The Growth of Private Equity in Concierge Medicine and The State of Private Medicine 2026. For the wearable-data angle specifically, see What Whoop's $575M Raise Means for Your Concierge Doctor.
Find a Concierge or DPC Practice (or Get Yours Listed)
Search physician-led concierge and DPC practices by city, state, and specialty at nextmd.ai/search. If you run a practice and want to add or claim a listing, start at nextmd.ai. For the patient-side view, see How to Choose the Right Concierge or DPC Doctor.
Sources
Fierce Healthcare. (2026). Digital health startups raked in $4B during Q1 with 12 megadeals driving investment: Rock Health. https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/digital-health/digital-health-startups-raked-4b-q1-12-megadeals-driving-investment-rock-health
Oak HC/FT. (2024). Oak HC/FT closes fifth fund at $1.94 billion. https://www.oakhcft.com/news/oak-hc-ft-closes-fifth-fund-at-1-94-billion-continuing-our-legacy-while-investing-in-the-future
Becker's Hospital Review. (2025). Ambience Healthcare reaches $1.25B valuation. https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/healthcare-information-technology/ai/ambience-healthcare-reaches-1-25b-valuation/
Andreessen Horowitz. (2022). New year, new fund, new opportunities in Bio + Health. https://a16z.com/2022/01/10/new-year-new-fund-new-opportunities-in-bio-health/
Fierce Healthcare. (2025). Hippocratic AI lands $126M Series C to expand patient-facing AI agents, fuel M&A. https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/ai-and-machine-learning/hippocratic-ai-lands-126m-series-c-expand-patient-facing-ai-agents-fuel-ma
TechCrunch. (2024). Foresite Capital raises $900M sixth fund for investing in healthcare companies. https://techcrunch.com/2024/06/12/foresite-capital-raises-900m-sixth-fund-for-investing-in-healthcare-companies/
MobiHealthNews. (2025). Thyme Care garners $97M, achieves profitability. https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/thyme-care-garners-97m-achieves-profitability
PitchBook. (2024). Transformation Capital Fund III profile. https://pitchbook.com/profiles/fund/20723-32F
MobiHealthNews. (2025). Rad AI scores $60M, boosting its valuation to $525M. https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/rad-ai-scores-60m-boosting-its-valuation-525m
STAT News. (2024). General Catalyst raises $8 billion, with $750 million for health care bets. https://www.statnews.com/2024/10/24/general-catalyst-health-care-venture-fund-750-million-raise/
MobiHealthNews. (2026). Commure raises $70M, boosting post-money valuation to $7B. https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/commure-raises-70m-boosting-post-money-valuation-7b
Fierce Healthcare. (2023). Define Ventures raises $460M to invest in early-stage digital health startups. https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/digital-health/define-ventures-raises-460m-invest-early-stage-digital-health-startups
MobiHealthNews. (2025). Layer Health garners $21M for AI chart review platform. https://www.mobihealthnews.com/news/layer-health-garners-21m-ai-chart-review-platform
PR Newswire. (2025). Town Hall Ventures announces $440 million Fund IV to advance AI and healthcare innovation for underserved communities. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/town-hall-ventures-announces-440-million-fund-iv-to-advance-ai-and-healthcare-innovation-for-underserved-communities-302584303.html
Town Hall Ventures. (2026). Portfolio. https://www.townhallventures.com/portfolio
PR Newswire. (2026). Frist Cressey Ventures announces oversubscribed $425M Fund IV to reshape care delivery. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/frist-cressey-ventures-announces-oversubscribed-425m-fund-iv-to-reshape-care-delivery-302691405.html
Frist Cressey Ventures. (2025). One to One Health partners with Frist Cressey Ventures on $12M investment to scale AI-enabled primary care. https://fcventures.com/one-to-one-health-partners-with-frist-cressey-ventures-on-12m-investment-to-scale-ai-enabled-primary-care/
HIT Consultant. (2022). Health Tech VC firm Flare Capital Partners closes $350M fund. https://hitconsultant.net/2022/04/29/health-tech-vc-firm-flare-capital-partners-closes-350m-fund/
Flare Capital Partners. (2025). Portfolio. https://www.flarecapital.com/portfolio
Fierce Healthcare. (2023). Healthcare VC 7wireVentures closes $217M fund to double down on digital health investments. https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/digital-health/healthcare-vc-7wireventures-closes-217m-fund-double-down-digital-health-investments
Mount Sinai Solutions. (2023). Concierge medicine patient volumes and panel sizes. Mount Sinai Health System. Referenced in NextMD canonical panel-size standards (03_wiki/Topics/Industry/panel-size-standards.md).
Source Attribution
Inspired by: biotech-vc-overview, top-10-healthtech-vcs-2026-04-26
Medical/operational claims verified against: panel-size-standards
Review Notes
2026-05-24 v2 rebuild: reframed from "Top 20 firms by concierge-relevance" to "Top 10 health-AI VC firms ranked objectively by dedicated healthcare fund size" at user request. Ranking metric chosen by user = dedicated health/bio fund size.
Ranking figures (all sourced, single most-recent dedicated healthcare fund): Oak HC/FT $1.94B (Fund V, 2024, health+fintech); a16z Bio+Health $1.5B (Bio Fund IV 2022; $700M 2026 raise noted); Foresite $900M (Fund VI 2024); Transformation Capital $800M (Fund III, PitchBook); GC $750M health allocation 2024 (HA Fund II $670M 2022); Define $460M (2023); Town Hall $440M (Fund IV 2025); Frist Cressey $425M (Fund IV, Feb 2026); Flare $350M (Fund III 2022); 7wire $217M.
Considered .406 Ventures ($265M) for the 10th slot but replaced it with Frist Cressey ($425M Fund IV, Feb 2026): more current, larger, purely healthcare (vs .406's health+cyber mix), and Nashville/AI-native-care focus is more on-theme. .406's dmnews source also 404'd.
Generalists with no dedicated health fund moved to a separate, explicitly-unranked section (Sequoia, Lightspeed, Founders Fund, Khosla, Bessemer, GV, NEA, Lux). Biotech/life-sciences megafunds (OrbiMed, Bain Capital Life Sciences, F-Prime) noted as a different lane, not ranked.
Every firm→flagship-company link verified against investor lists this session (no assumed attributions): Oak→Ambience, a16z→Hippocratic, Foresite→Thyme Care, Transformation→Rad AI (led Series C), GC→Commure, Define→Layer Health (led Series A), Town Hall→Cityblock, Frist Cressey→One to One Health (led $12M), Flare→HealthVerity, 7wire→Transcarent.
Em-dash check: zero in body (headers use colons; generalist bullets use periods).
Acronyms defined on first use: AI, DPC, EHR, MIT, SPAC, BAA, HIPAA.
Link verification: run
python3 05_system/Scripts/verify-blog-links.py <file> --check-externaland require exit 0 before flipping to ready.Open judgment calls for user:
"Dedicated health fund" ranking necessarily favors specialists and pushes marquee generalists (Sequoia, Lightspeed) into the unranked section. To keep marquee names in the ranking, switch the metric to "latest flagship fund size" and I'll re-rank.
Town Hall (underserved/value-based care) and Flare/HealthVerity (data infrastructure) are low on direct concierge relevance; they earn spots on fund size, not concierge fit. Can swap for higher-concierge-fit firms if you want concierge weighted back in.
Filename still reads draft-top-20-...; rename to draft-top-10-... on approval.