Andy Slavitt launched Town Hall Ventures in 2018 shortly after a two-year stint as acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. His bet: that venture capital investments in healthtech innovation for low-income and underserved communities in the US could yield attractive returns alongside meaningful impact.
Slavitt has convinced John Doerr, the billionaire chairman of Kleiner Perkins, who has invested in every single Town Hall venture fund. “The obsession that the Town Hall team has with turning mission into business alpha has made it easy,” said Doerr, who has re-upped in the New York-based firm’s latest fund.
The $440 million fund is targeting health entrepreneurs harnessing AI and other innovations—from therapeutics and diagnostics to smart devices—to improve outcomes, expand access, and cut costs for underserved patients.
Healthtech ventures
The new fund, Town Hall’s largest to date, brings the firm’s total assets under management to $1.4 billion. Its first three funds have backed 42 companies at various venture stages. Nearly a dozen of them have reached unicorn status, including Brooklyn-based Cityblock Health, which partners with community health organizations to deliver primary care, behavioral health and social services to Medicaid and low-income Medicare patients in the US.
Town Hall has seeded Habitat Health, a San Francisco-based company that offers health and social care to older adults on Medicaid and Medicare who want to live independently in their homes. Town Hall’s third fund raised $350 million in 2022 and its first two funds raised $115 million and $275 million respectively.
Healthy youths
One of Town Hall’s latest investments was in Marble Health, a New York-based company expanding access to personalized and evidence-based mental health in schools across the country.
Amid rising anxiety, depression and suicide, young Americans who depend on Medicaid for mental health care could be among the hardest hit by the Trump administration’s cuts to Medicaid. “Most schools want to support their students’ mental health, but they’re stretched thin and often can’t afford to bring in help,” said Amy Cheetham of Costanoa Ventures, which also invested in Marble’s $15.5 million Series A round with Khosla Ventures.
Since it launched last year, Marble’s licensed therapists have delivered more than 15,000 sessions for students who might otherwise struggle to access care. The company has secured paid contracts with Medicaid and commercial payers including Aetna, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts and United Healthcare Medicare Advantage.
