Hello,
Welcome to your regularly scheduled Friday edition of Dispensed, where we're looking forward to the weekend after finally getting out our list of 30 leaders under 40 transforming healthcare. We hope you all have enjoyed the project as much as we enjoyed getting to know the honorees this summer. Click here to see the whole list.
But first, I wanted to quickly catch up on the drama surrounding Amazon's online pharmacy PillPack.
Last week, I spent some time digging into the back-and-forth between the tech giant and health data company Surescripts over access to medication history information that Surescripts collects. Between threats of lawsuits and claims of reporting companies to the FBI, it's sure escalated quickly.
That, combined with CNBC's report Tuesday that PillPack has run into issues working with retail pharmacy giants Walgreens and CVS when trying to transfer over prescriptions, to me gets to the heart of a key issue facing the pharmacy industry: Who should be allowed to have what patient data, when?
I spoke with independent pharmacists to get some more context about how medication information is shared today and the pros and cons that come with having more data at your fingertips. Find out more about the debate here.
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And then in case you missed it, we introduced our 30 leaders under 40 transforming healthcare this week.
Meet the 30 young leaders who are transforming the future of healthcare and disrupting a $3.5 trillion industry
Over the next few weeks, we'll be putting out stories based on the conversations we had with the nominees.
- From Clarrie Feinstein's conversation with Fred Hutch's Emily Silgard: A top leader using tech to tackle cancer told us how to get through the challenges of a career switch
- From Emma Court's conversation with Blue Shield of California's Chris Esguerra: A top US health insurer has saved $4 million in one year by making a simple change, and it could be a lesson for others on how to transform a system from the inside out
- From my conversation with Providence St. Joseph Health's Sara Vaezy: A top young executive at a 160-year-old health system reveals why leaders looking to disrupt healthcare from within can't think in decade-long timeframes
- From Emma's conversation with 23andMe VP Emily Drabant Conley: A VP at a $2.5 billion startup reveals exactly how she asked her boss for a big promotion at just 33 years old - and got it
- From Clarrie's chat with UniteUs founder Dan Brillman: How an Air Force Reserve pilot raised $45 million to build a company after struggling to help his fellow veterans
And we asked all our nominees for their best career advice. And wow, there's a lot of good stuff they shared (Definitely taking CVS Health's Ben Wanamaker's advice to "Show up on time" to heart). Read all of their advice.
How to make an impact on the $3.5 trillion healthcare industry, according to 30 young leaders who are transforming it
Up next: A little biotech dispatch from our pharma reporter, Emma Court:
This week has been a tumultuous one for biotech companies. The FDA revealed that there had been "data manipulation" with a brand-new gene therapy treatment from the biotech AveXis (now owned by Novartis), but said it was only a small portion of the data and the gene therapy, Zolgensma, should stay on the market. Then there was Sarepta, Kala, Amarin, Nektar and more - all saw their stocks seesawing this week on new developments.
We think biotech investor Brad Loncar put it best, here.
Lastly, Clarrie rounded up the 41 hottest AI startups out there, even looking beyond healthcare to finance, transportation, etc. Thanks to CB Insights for pulling that data together.
Clarrie breaks down what each company is working on and how they've made it to $1 billion valuations.
These are the 41 hottest AI startups worth at least $1 billion, across healthcare, finance, transportation and more
Clarrie and Emma also had a big report out this week on how much each candidate in the 2020 presidential campaign has taken from people who work in healthcare (In light of Sen. Bernie Sanders' commitment not to take donations from the pharmaceutical and health insurance industries).
Thanks to Yutong Yuan on Business Insider's graphics team for the great visualization of the tallies.
Read more about the donations to each candidate here.
With that, I'm sure I've given you enough reading material for the whole month! Stay tuned this weekend for more from our 30 under 40 project, and we'll be back next week with more dispatches from the world of health, pharma, and biotech.
In the meantime, tips? Last-minute wedding planning advice? Thoughts on all the biotech drama that unfolded this week? You can find me at lramsey@businessinsider.com and the whole healthcare team at healthcare@businessinsider.com.
- Lydia
