Hippocratic AI Secures $53M Funding from General Catalyst, Memorial Hermann, UHS, a16z and others

Hippocratic AI emerged from stealth mode approximately a year ago, unveiling its inaugural generative AI product and securing $53 million in series A funding, as announced on Monday. This fresh injection of funds has propelled the company’s valuation to $500 million, according to its executives, bringing its total fundraising to $120 million, which includes a $50 million seed round last May.
With the increasing adoption of AI in healthcare, Hippocratic has garnered support from notable investors such as Premji Invest, General Catalyst, SV Angel, and Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) Bio + Health. The startup has also attracted backing from various health systems, including Memorial Hermann Health System, Cincinnati Children’s, and Universal Health Services (UHS).
Founded by serial entrepreneur Munjal Shah, alongside a diverse team of professionals from esteemed institutions such as El Camino Health and Google, Hippocratic AI has placed a strong emphasis on safety over immediate financial gains. This strategic focus resonated with lead investors during its oversubscribed series A round.
Dedicated to constructing the premier large language model for healthcare, Hippocratic has introduced its inaugural product for phase three safety testing: a task-specific, generative AI-driven healthcare agent. The company intends to utilize the new funding to conduct safety tests and expedite product development.
The startup’s staffing marketplace enables the deployment of auto-pilot generative AI-powered agents to deliver low-risk, non-diagnostic patient-facing services, addressing the global shortage of healthcare personnel. While these agents will not engage with patients unsupervised until the conclusion of phase three testing, their potential roles include chronic care management, post-discharge follow-up, and wellness surveys.
Hemant Taneja, CEO of General Catalyst, affirms that Hippocratic AI has experienced rapid expansion while prioritizing safety, positioning itself as a frontrunner in revolutionizing healthcare to achieve proactive, affordable, and equitable outcomes.
In collaboration with Nvidia, Hippocratic aims to develop empathetic AI healthcare agents to facilitate natural, low-latency conversational interactions with patients, crucial for fostering emotional connections. This collaboration was showcased at Nvidia GTC, featuring a generative AI healthcare agent avatar utilizing Nvidia’s Avatar Cloud Engine suite.
Hippocratic has implemented a clinician-driven safety testing system for its large language models (LLMs), involving rigorous phases to ensure adherence to critical safety standards. Initial testing phases were conducted by physicians and nurses, with subsequent phases expanding to include thousands of licensed healthcare professionals and system partners.
Preliminary assessments indicate that Hippocratic’s AI agents perform comparably to licensed nurses and outperform larger general-purpose LLMs in terms of medical accuracy and safety, as evidenced by recent research findings.
Over the past year, Hippocratic has established AI oversight groups to maintain adherence to safety protocols, including safety governance, a Physician Advisory Council, and a Nurse Advisory Council.
As phase three testing commences, Hippocratic AI plans to collaborate with its partners to validate the safety and efficacy of its generative AI-based product, expanding testing to involve more licensed healthcare professionals and system partners.