# Transcript: Featured Session: Breaking Barriers, Building Solutions: Meet the Changemakers Transforming Health Innovation

**Date:** March 13, 2026 · 10:30 PM  
**Session:** [Featured Session: Breaking Barriers, Building Solutions: Meet the Changemakers Transforming Health Innovation](/sessions/2026-03-13/pp1150310-featured-session-breaking-barriers-building-solutions-meet-the-changemakers-tran)

## Summary

Serena Williams (Entrepreneur-in-Residence for Reckitt Catalyst), Katherine Casey Nanda (Acumen America), Ryan Dullea (Reckitt), Mika Eddy (Malama Health), and Kwamane Liddell (Thrivelink) discuss how lived experience drives breakthrough health innovation. The panel covers fundraising as underrepresented founders, the US maternal health crisis, AI-powered social determinants navigation, and how corporate-startup partnerships can accelerate health equity.

## Topics

`health equity` · `maternal health` · `social determinants of health` · `underrepresented founders` · `venture capital` · `startup fundraising` · `ai in healthcare` · `serena williams` · `community health`

## Key Takeaways

1. Your zip code is more deterministic of life expectancy than your genetic code — neighborhoods just 3-4 miles apart in Austin have a 20-year gap in life expectancy.
2. Less than 2% of venture capital goes to female founders, yet one shared portfolio company got 300 nos before becoming a billion-dollar company — persistence through rejection is non-negotiable.
3. Malama Health started with a WhatsApp group of 10 pregnant women giving feedback and now serves 50,000 — authentic community-first design scales better than building for millions from day one.
4. Thrivelink built telephonic AI agents instead of apps because the target population can say their address but may not be able to type it — inclusive design means meeting users where they actually are.
5. Serena Williams reframes failure: 'You only fail if you don't try' — the best founders can articulate what didn't work and why, which signals resilience more than a perfect track record.

## Full Transcript

good morning everyone and thank you for that awesome South by Southwest welcome. It's almost like there's someone that you're really excited to see here this morning. My name is Katherine Casey. I'm the co-founder and managing partner of Acumen America and I'm really honored to host this conversation today. At Acument
America, we invest in early stage companies that are tackling issues of poverty across the United States.

To date, over the last 10 years, we've backed almost 50 founders, extraordinary founders like Nika and Quaine who are tackling some of our country's hardest challenges. And um I'm incredibly excited for us to talk today about improving health equity in America. Health equity is a really simple concept that your background should not determine the quality of care that you receive. But the reality in America today is that your zip code is more
deterministic of your life expectancy than your genetic code. So in Austin where we sit, neighborhoods just three or four miles apart will have a difference in life expectancy of almost 20 years because of different access to doctors, food, education, and other resources.

Now, Serena and I get to meet entrepreneurs every day who are trying to change this. But what we often see is that the entrepreneurs that are best positioned to solve these challenges are overlooked and underfunded because of what they look like or where they come
from. And all of us on this stage believe that if we can change that, we can drive innovation to where it's needed most and help improve health in communities across the country. So with that we will kick off with introductions. I have the great pleasure of beginning with the GOAT herself, the um extraordinary 23time Grand Slam winner, global icon, uh entrepreneur, someone I've come to
know as a really remarkable investor, um and catalyst entrepreneur and residence, Serena Williams.

Thank you. Serena would love to start just hearing a little bit about your journey and uh your role at at Catalyst. Well, my role has been really exciting as you know at Catalyst as an entrepreneur entrepreneur and residents. You know what I really love? Well, I've as also as a VC I love investing.

I feel I've been investing for over 15 years now. And also with our fund Serena Ventures, we do a lot of investing in
underrepresented founders and women and and also just great investors. to really take away that line of diversity and just invest in great founders and great people. And so that's what we like to do. And now what we're doing here is quite interesting because we've seen a lot of really amazing founders that are solving really big problems in their communities.

And as as VC, we don't often look we're always looking at huge numbers and huge returns, which are which is great, by the way. But that's one thing that I've loved at Catalyst is we're putting money behind entrepreneurs
and others as well, but over 200 women and under reppresented founders that are actually solving problems in their local communities. We were in uh what was it? Paris or London in France. We were somewhere in the world and we met some really great entrepreneurs that were solving the water system and how to clean water because it was impossible for their kids and their families to be able to have clean water which was affecting their children which is which was killing their kids.

Um and as we think about it the future that's their future. They
didn't have one if they didn't have their children to live onto that. So we met some amazing women, you know, two different companies actually that was really attacking that problem at a local level, which is something that we're doing at Catalyst. So it's been really great to be an entrepreneur in residence and to get on calls and to get on Zooms or and or to meet in person some of these founders and just help them in a different way than we don't you do that a lot as a VC, but this is different. And it's it's really exciting to just be elbows deep, hands down, really
answering questions, really guiding some of the entrepreneurs and really helping them with their journey and explaining to them what makes a successful founder and how to keep going as an entrepreneur and how to keep building and what is the problem in your community and how are you going to solve that problem and how can we help you solve that problem.

And so that's what I'm doing here as an entrepreur entrepreneur and residence. And it's really it's been really fun and it's been really exciting to to be a part of something so um just moving, you know, just something
so moving and so creating and helping so many people. Yeah. And you're already adding so much value and we're just getting started. Um Ryan would love for you to introduce yourself.

Yeah. Great. Hi everybody. My name is Ryan Delay. I'm here on behalf of Wreckit.

Uh now some of you may not necessarily recognize the name Wreckit but you'll probably recognize some of the brands that you use on an everyday basis from Lysol to Mucinx to finished dishwashing detergent here in the US and for those of you joining from around the world brands like DetL strepols and Durex around the rest of the globe for over 200 years we've had these brands
providing benefits across health and hygiene for consumers all around the world and what's been core to us on that journey whether it's fighting Spanish flu or COVID with brands like Lysol or taking care of consumers everyday needs through cold and flu illness with brands like Mucenex is really helping improve the lives of an everyday basis for consumers. What I love about our portfolio is not just the sales or the revenue it generates for our company but the good they do on a day in dayout basis helping individuals live healthier happier lives as they move through. As
part of our journey as Wreckit and over the 200 years we've been there, we also believe we have a responsibility beyond that to help provide positive hygiene and health outcomes in the communities in which we exist and where we serve as well. That's part of the reason why I'm so thrilled to be here with this great group of people having fantastic partners like Acumen with Katherine joining us here on the stage. Serena obviously playing a key role in this program as we've gone forward and thenWqaame and Mika as a couple of the representatives for the entrepreneurs that we've been supporting through that on the journey that we're going to go on together to continue to make the world a
better place.

And I have to just say something to that. When I first had an opportunity to talk with Wreckit and meet with them, they didn't want me to be a brand ambassador. They're like, "The last thing we want you to do is be associated with our products." Like you, like he said, you may have not heard of the company, but you've definitely heard of some of their a lot of their products. And I really appreciated that because it was really a point that they wanted to make that they were really genuinely here to help founders. They're really genuinely here to pick up that conversation about health and hygiene and across the globe and how much that
affects everyone.

And that that was just something I had actually never heard before. And it was so refreshing and so authentic to hear and to be a part of something that is so much bigger than you know what what they already do in a different way and I you know I really just wanted to say that yeah it's really groundbreaking work for a global corporation. Um Ma can you introduce yourself and malama of course. Hi everyone, Nika Eddie. Um, so honored to be here.

We're actually acummen and part of the wreck wrecket program. Um, as a catalyst
entrepreneur, we're the latest to add to the portfolio. Malama means to nurture, take care of, and malama was born out of my personal experience with three high-risisk pregnancies and also after growing up with a grandmother as an OBGYn. Um, we created Malama as a community-based doula powered with technology, remote monitoring, and preventative care for chronic conditions in order to dramatically improve maternal health outcomes in this country. So, very excited to be here.

Thank you. And hi, uh, my name is Liddell. I'm the
founder and CEO of Thrive Link. Uh, we build AI agents that talk to people and help them sign up for things like food, housing, transportation. Um, we started out because I'm an emergency department nurse and I traveled to all these places where families were losing their lives, their well-being, having strokes, etc.

But they didn't need to. There were programs that we knew existed in the community that we could have helped them get that medication or we could have helped them get into that housing program. But as a nurse standing at the bedside, there was no easy way for me to
say, "Hey, Miss Jones, you need this. Let me help you get there." Um, so we built Thrive Link. Started off as a nonprofit where we would just voluntarily help people do paperwork.

Um, and with supporters, we were able to grow and now we serve hospitals and health insurance companies in more than 17 states. And we just really excited to be here. All right, so we're going to dive in. We're going to move fast and cover five topics. Uh founder story, founder experience, uh branding, fundraising, networking, and growth.

And then we
really want to hear from all of you. So send your questions in and we'll open up to a conversation at the end. Um I want to start picking up on both of your incredible stories, Mika and at Acument America, and I know Serena and your investing. We look for founders with real passion for the problems they're trying to solve and in many cases lived experience of those problems because we think that often makes for the best businesses and that it's particularly important in healthcare where trust and cultural knowledge matters so much. Um so would love Ma to start with you and
hear about how your personal experience informed what you're building at Thrive at um Malama not Thrive Link and how you think that sets you up for success in the healthcare space.

Yeah, of course. And hopefully Malama will partner with Thrive Blank in the future. Um so I mentioned Malama means to nurture take care of. We our mission is to nurture and take care of mothers. We are in the midst of a maternal health crisis in this country.

The US ranks dead last in terms of maternal health outcomes. That includes everything from postpartum um eclampsia, postpartum
hemorrhage. Um 53% of maternal related deaths actually happen in the postpartum period. And yet we have one single six week visit. And other than that, which by the way, women insured by Medicaid, which covers nearly half of births in this country, only about 30% go in for that postpartum visit.

And I mentioned my grandmother. I grew up in Tokyo. I'm Chinese. My grandmother moved over from China. A long backstory, but I grew up really watching her um deliver up to 30
babies a day, sometimes in rural Japan.

And um she also would tell me stories. Sometimes she would come home and say, you know, uh I held a woman's uterus. It fell out today. And just these crazy stories and how embedded she was in the community and her work. She worked up until she got sick and unfortunately passed away.

Um but this was her her passion and um from the early stages I that was in in part of my life. Um, and then I had my own high-risisk pregnancy. I was actually working at United Healthcare and Optum at the time where Quaamine was at as well and uh realized that the system in especially in the US was truly not built um for healthy outcomes for women and particularly if you do not have privilege or a platform that oftentimes these outcomes are left to chance. And um I had a doula for my uh first pregnancy which was high-risisk ended up being induced and um looked for this continuous care between visit that
um unfortunately our system is not designed for given the prenatal kind of episodic care. Um, but because I had a doula, because I was fortunate enough to access that and to navigate, uh, I was able to, um, have a healthy I have a son who's now five, u move through COVID and, um, come out on the other end.

But we really designed Malama in order to help fill the gaps and address the needs that we saw. And from day one, we've designed for those who are insured by Medicaid. So again, the nearly 50% of births that are covered by Medicaid by providing continuous between visit
support led by a community-based doula who knows that corner wick has diapers today or where um car seats are because you can't go home from the hospital without a car seat. Um and is able to connect to essential resources that fundamentally move the needle on maternal health outcomes. coming.

Um, my my experience at healthcare started when uh my uncle had a massive stroke when he
was just a few years older than I am right now. And he otherwise he looked fit. He rode motorcycles. He if you saw him, you wouldn't expect him to be someone who's going to have a stroke soon. And he lived with my grandparents for the rest of his life and wasn't able to walk and and communicate.

And that happened when I was about in middle school. Then my professional introduction because from there we we saw what social determinants of health are without having a name to it because so many people in my family and communities had heart attacks and
strokes or died in their sleep as they got older. And we thought it was something that's genetic. And uh uh my freshman year in college, I dropped out of college and I became a janitor at the local hospital and I didn't know what a teaching hospital was. There were like doctors, uh medical school students and nursing students and all those things in the hallways and I was just really curious and I stood outside of the the cafeteria every day and just talked to whoever would talk to me about what they do.

Uh one day I thought I was in trouble. uh one of the nurses called me
in her office and because I was just asking everyone so many questions and she explained what healthc care was to me and how policies impact the things that happen and all those things. Uh that day I changed my major I I enrolled in community college and I became a nurse and as I was at the bedside working at mostly stroke centers I kept seeing I I traveled Chicago, St. Louis, Houston, etc. all these places where I saw people who look like me were
communities similar to mine that were also having heart attacks and strokes and there was a there was a huge difference that I was seeing that patients didn't need more health care they needed food housing transportation and the uh my my poor mentor at the time she's uh she's now the president of the University of Louisville health system it was her first day as a chief nurse and I and I might have been her first meeting with me complaining about all these people are so sick but don't need to be.

Um I then became a lawyer um a healthcare lawyer where I led at large
health systems and health plans where I saw the problem evolve it just in a few years of my career from this is just something that's my family to this is just something to the the patients that I serve to millions of people across the country that are being impacted. Um, and one of the key principles that I that I learned just as a nurse before thinking about being a founder or building a product was we really thought about working with the communities directly to
learn how to do this thing. And as we thought about how do we get a person who's sitting in a doctor's office or who just got health insurance, how do we get them to the wheelchair or home health or medication in an easy way? And where we started in in that experience, I thought about my family. So So thinking about building an app that someone has to download from app store, you can forget it.

That wasn't going to work. If I if I thought about I wanted to build something that would be inclusive to my granddad, but something that we work together with part with our
partners was people might not be able to text or type a I don't know within the app, but they can say their address, they can say where they live, they can say the all the things that they need to get into these programs. So, we built a telephonic AI agent that allows people to talk. And since then, we've helped thousands of families access healthy food, thousands of families. Someone won the Boston h the Boston housing lottery.

Um, and just so many things that we get
to see in real life. And it's and it's one of the reasons that we are growing and expanding and being able to have these real real stories and real impact on people. We're just so thankful. I feel blessed to be able to do that work. really powerful stories and Serena, you often talk about the importance of having a story and then being able to sell that story.

Um, can you talk about what you look for in a founder story when you're meeting
founders and how those stories can become the cornerstone of a good brand? Well, I think we just heard it right today from Mikwa. For us, when we're at Serena Ventures and we're looking at what to invest in, we want to hear something that's authentic. Ma said something very true to her that her grandmother had an experience in it. The same thing, his uncle and which drove him into healthcare.

For us, it's we when people are investing in things, and you probably see this all the time as well, because it's just a white space and
there's a lot of money to be made, but there's no true connection to that, then you don't really have founders that are determined to stay and ask questions and go to complain about why things aren't happening. They they're more a little lackadasical about it. They're not as passionate about it. And so for us, when we're talking to founders, storytelling is obviously super important. You have to be able to tell your story in such a big way that like everyone here after hearing these two stories are probably felt some emotional tug at you, right?

Um, and that's what you want as that's
what you want your founders to do. And when you're when I'm in listen to these pitch meetings, I want to feel a tug whether it's for something in the community or whether it's for an AI product. We want to feel something that also has a true connection because when they have a true connection, we know that they're not going to stop. they're gonna continue to knock down another door. They're gonna continue to knock on another door and to continue to just they're never going to give up.

And so that's something that's truly truly truly good to to hear from our founders
today. And also when I'm listening to different pitches, it's like we need to hear some true connection that you have. And what is that connection? It doesn't have to be something directly that happened to you. It could be us extended family.

It could be friends, but it has to be some real connection. So true. Yeah. And Ryan, Wreckit's home to some of the world's best known health and hygiene brands. How do you think about the value that Wreckit can bring to startup entrepreneurs like Mika and when you think about your brand building experience?

It's a great question. Thanks, Katherine. Um, yeah, we've been building
brands for over 200 years. Uh, and we have a set playbook within our organization of what enables those brands to be successful. What we've done as an entity is we've actually looked to define 240 individuals within Wreckit to help serve as mentors.

These are not just people focused on commercial, but it's across the entire ecosystem of business would need to run from supply to IT and D to regulatory health care professionals that are critically important in some of the areas that these entrepreneurs are playing into. So this lets them tap into that expertise
of those 240 people within us. partnering that with then support and funding uh in addition to that uh enables us to hopefully achieve some great things together. Uh what I'm probably most proud about is we have 240 spots for mentors. We actually had 240% over that number of people wanting to support.

So we have fantastic mentors that we were able to pick from spanning 23 countries around the world who have you know tens or decades or hundreds of years of experience to be able to provide these. That was nice. I got to be able to meet
some of them just uh recently like a week ago to meet some of the mentors that Wreckit had and it was really good to see the enthusiasm that they had and how they really wanted to genuinely help founders and like you said they come from all different types of backgrounds. So you not only have your entrepreneurs and residents but you also have people that's been in the wrecket and that's been able to really help the founders. Yeah, it's amazing to see the interest and the some of the early value we're seeing created for entrepreneurs.

Um, I'm going to shift slightly to the idea
of fundraising, which is obviously one of the most important parts of building an early stage company. Um, one of the constant themes in my 20 years of impact investing has been the persistent underfunding of female founders and founders of color. Um, Serena, you and I have talked a lot about the less than 2% of venture capital funding that goes to female founders and even less that goes to founders of color. Um, and you and I have both tried to build portfolios that
intentionally reflect the incredible diversity of this country because we think that makes for smart investing. Um, ma, despite some of those huge barriers, you've been a rockar fundraising.

We just closed uh a major uh seed fund raise at over $9 million from a wide range of investors, announced it yesterday. Um can you talk about your experience raising as a a female founder in women's health and any lessons you can share from that experience? Yeah, thank you. And yes, very excited about the announcement. It was a long
time coming.

Um and some of our early very early day one believers are sitting in the room here as well. um at every step of the way. You mentioned the 2%. That's something that gets we hear all the time. Um and at the same time, I don't want that to be defeating.

I want there to be hope in the room. And at every turn you can find someone who believes in investing in underrepresented entrepreneurs, those who truly have the lived experiences
because these we are the people who are going to be able to solve and bring about creative solutions to problems that have manifested for for a very long time. And in order to truly change the system, you need to invest in the people who understand what it's like to be up at 3 in the morning with a bad NST result or an amnocentesis the next day or you know a planned C-section and to know what that feels like and that fear and anxiety that keeps you up um between visit between that you know 10 15 minute you get with the OB. Um and so investing and and finding those people who open
the doors we went through a Y cominator. It's a very uh it's a tech accelerator very famous in in the Bay Area.

We found our female uh partner for YC was a women's health founder herself and she opened the door to other women's health companies. Um so look for Acumen America who is our lead for this round. Um similarly our board member Venu on the Acumen team she leads the Medicaid innovation collaborative. So look for those people. will be very intentional
about who you bring on to your cap table as well so that incentives are aligned and that you can continue to deliver on the mission.

The other point I'll add is don't be dependent on any one type of capital. So we have been very fortunate to have gone after non-dilutive funding and received an NIH um SBIR grant which is something that's less talked about especially in kind of the Silicon Valley and world. Um we also received funding through the state of California and um
both of those are non-diluted funding pieces which just allows you to be less dependent on any single source of capital. So don't give up if the VCs continue to say no no no. They always say here are 100 nos and you just need one yes.

Um so look for those believers, look for those door openers like Acumen, like Wreckit who believe in under in funding underserved founders who have that lived experience. Um, and then and also continue to look for other sources of capital. Being an entrepreneur is just continuously reinventing yourself. And probably no one on stage has done
that better than than Serena. And you just have to you hit a wall, you pivot.

You hit a wall, you pivot. And that's kind of the fundraising experience. Serena, we share an entrepreneur in our portfolio who got 300 nos before we invested. Um, and now they're valued at a billion dollars. So you can, if you keep breaking down those walls, you can achieve a ton.

Yeah. Um you hinted at this ma but we know that it takes a lot more than capital to build an early stage company. Um you spoke about this as well Ryan. It's access to strategic support to
networks to people who can open doors for you. Um at Acument America we spend a lot of time connecting our healthcare founders to buyers to policy makers to those people who can ensure help ensure adoption and success at the early stages.

Um, I was talking to that same entrepreneur um, the other day that we share in our portfolio, Serena, and he was saying one of the reasons he values you so much as an investor is that you don't just write a check, you really roll up your sleeves and and um, help with all that you can. Can you talk about how you've thought about that at
Serena Ventures and the kind of role you play and how you think about that in the catalyst context? Yeah. Um that's what I love about the catalyst context is that we have an opportunity to work with the entrepreneurs and help them and be a mentor to them if they have any questions or you know they could also give us advice too. We learned so much at the same time.

And um what we do, and you know this in BC, you can't just write a check. And as Mika said, it's so so important who you put around your your cap table because
checks are great and you do want some of those too, but you also want at least one or two people that can really guide you and to help you decide what to do next or what companies to do or how to scale your business, how to scale your team, how to do so many things. Um, and that's so important in who you're referring to. I amum I just really believed in what he's doing and I still believe in what he's doing and it's just really amazing. And so for us it's like we're not just going we're not people that just going to sit down and write a check.

We're going to try to introduce
you to people. We're going to open a lot of doors. We're going to pick up the phone and make lots of phone calls get you where you need to go. And also we're going to offer advice on how from down to fundraising to building. And so, um, I think when you look at a lot of great VCs, that's definitely what the best does.

It's just because at the end of the day, we want to succeed. You know, we're spending money because we want them to be a huge company. Um, that's
the name of the game in VC. Um, and so for us, it's it make it it's it's only to our benefit and sometimes to the benefit of the betterment of the community when you do pick up the phone and you help make a lots of introductions. VC is really about who you know, right?

It's connections, introductions. And so that is the name of the game and that's how we try to play it. Yeah. And no one better than you to help amplify um this work. Um, can you talk about that from the perspective of a founder and, uh, what
excites you about working with Serena and with Wreckit?

Yeah. Um, you know, there's nothing I can learn from like one of the most legendary athletes of all time. Um it's an incredibly exciting experience because I think of building and our team we think about it we use sports analogies a lot and it is hard to win and I say even impossible to build the thing that we want to do and eradicate the problems
that we want to solve without a great team. And there are stages where that matters and you think about it in different ways. And something that that we're really excited about, we're a preede company where we just closed our preede round and we've done all this introductory work.

We have these introductory uh contracts and partners. Um I'm excited to even even thinking about being in the room today. My mom's here and John, my my best friend. Where's your mom? Actually, there she is.

There's mom and uh John, my best friend who leads growth on our team as we're thinking about Mika use the term day ones. You say look the this is how we're going to get started and build. I can say even through our fundraising experience being a first-time founder, Acumen's team helped us here's how you understand this these steps. Here's here's how you have conversations with other investors and think about how you
navigate this this ecosystem that you haven't been in before. And now already as we came into the program, we're connected to mentors and people who can help build our team on the in the the back end and help us think about you've done really great in all these areas.

How do we amplify? How do we make it better? Uh settings like this even um is just really incredible and exciting experience to think about what is the next stage or next two stages uh that we're that we're going in. and we've had the opportunity now with all of the support around us to just bolster that. Um I feel like we need one more round of applause for Quamin's mom who should get who should get all the credit.

She's busy filming. Um so we've covered a lot of aspects of early stage business building and one thing that all of us are focused on at Catalyst is how to help companies move from startup to really meaningful scale and systems change. Um, so would love to start with you again on what it's been like to start to grow Thrive Link in what's been a tough fundraising and policy environment and what your
aspirations are for scale for the company. Yeah, we've had some some really exciting things happen. I think as much as being a founder is difficult, it's equally exciting and it's it's an important thing.

When we started out, our team is really good at building this thing for our community. We talked about how building something that's built by our by people who understand the community is important and we were really good at that. We're also really good at partnering with the hospital systems, the health insurance companies
that that are experiencing these problems. The something that was really important that we were able to see working with investors and building out our team is that this problem and investors even helped us understand uh helped us understand how to apply this problem that we're solving in North Carolina and California how do you apply it in Texas in Minnesota in Michigan and it's really that that guiding force even while we were raising so I can say so
much the investors that that support us Now, and I think for founders, it's important to think about those people and how they can support you in and the type of questions they ask and the type of ways that in the ways that they try to try to assist you is that the investors that that close with us were helping us all the time as from the first conversation to after we close and beyond. So, what that allowed us to do was raise money and grow our company at the same time.

So in the time frame when we began to have our first conversations, we
almost doubled our patient population in that same amount of time. So now once we actually close and we have the dollars to go and go and expand the team, we're already working on that next level and that next step. So in this environment though, typically if you tell that story in just a different a different time in a different year, that means that you close in two weeks and you're good to go. So what what happened in our experience was it did it took a little longer. There were it it took a little longer.

You had to bring more people in the room and be strategic about which
investors were were right, which investors had timing matters. So where are they in their rounds where understanding all of the nuances in the ecosystem? But now more than ever, I think it's important to for founders to think about how do you continue to grow and show that the thing that you're solving, you are still relevant. You are building it in the way that will matter in the future so that as investors are having to really make these hard
decisions on where they support that you are at the top of the list. every time you follow, every time we talk again, uh, we have some more things to follow up on and and we're able to share how we're growing in those experiences.

Thanks, Ryan. Um, Reck's really placing a big bet on entrepreneurs here and and as I was saying earlier, it's really groundbreaking work for a company to do, not only with your capital, but with deep support from across some of the most talented people in your organization. How do you think about success for catalyst and scale for some
of the entrepreneurs that you support? Yeah, it's another great question. I think we have um been helping entrepreneurs around the globe for the last 5 years or so um and have just launched in the last year the catalyst program here in the US uh bringing on entrepreneurs we have here like and and Mika into the mix.

Um I think as we look at it going forward, our intent is to try to fund up to 200 uh different entrepreneurs around the world, 30 of which will be here in the US. um and provide a significant amount of funding, but also provide that support and that
help through the system to help people who have a lot of passion and a lot of expertise and knowledge in individual areas unlock the other business funds they the fundamentals they need in order to really take and make their idea break through the marketplace, get the funding they need, and create significant impact for the communities around us. Thanks. All right, Serena, last two questions to you before we open up to some conversation um with everyone in the room. uh Meek I can't remember if you said this orain that there's sort of no one better um in terms of thinking about building resilience and building a growth mindset and continuing to break down barriers.

Can you talk about um how
you've built that growth mindset and lessons for entrepreneurs on overcoming failure and continuing to push forward? I think growth mindset you have to want to grow. You can't just feel like you're already the best or I've already made it or I've already done this or succeeded in this race and there's always a next one, right? And there's always I always say that uh after winning a championship, I always say I don't really stare in the rearview mirror because I can't really see the what's happening in front of me and I'm moving forward and the traffic is in front of
you, not necessarily behind you. So for me it's really important you know if people and founders that have that growth mindset they're really open to continuing to be successful.

It's almost it's almost this weird disease like you just can't stop you know you want to keep going you want to keep going and you have this insatiable desire to be continue um also I think a growth mindset is someone who's also humble um because you have to be humble to take
feedback you have to be so humble to hear a no I mean we hear nos all the time and I'm sure you guys do too and like you have to be able to continue and have that resilience to continue And in order to do that, you have to have some sort of humility, right? Um, and the second part of your question, overcoming failures. I mean, one of the things I remember you saying, um, the last time we talked was, you know, we were talking about how do you receive criticism or how do you handle critics? And you were like, well, the good news is now the line is so long. I'm like, get to the back of the line.

But how do
you think about sort of overcoming um failure and and sort of dealing with I don't really when it comes to founders and startups and entrepreneurs I don't really think the word failure really exists. I mean yeah it didn't work out but you tried. You only fail if you don't try and I love that saying. Um, I feel like also when I'm talking to founders, I want to know what you did fail at because or what you didn't succeed at because that also shows me who you are as a person. It also shows me how you're going to continue to work and how you're
going to continue to do and that you you understand what it's like to lose.

And I think as much as you know we all probably hate losing, it's so important because that's when you learn your most like why didn't that work out? Why didn't that idea work out? Why didn't going in this direction work out? Um and you're never going to really understand that if it unless it doesn't work out and you kind of need that. Um, so for us that or for me that's kind of how I look at it.

I always try to change the way you view things. View it perception and just change it like instead of viewing
it as oh I failed. It's like oh that didn't work out. Why? And how can I make it better next time?

And that even just such a slight change and shift in your thought process and your thinking can really just change that whole conversation. I didn't fail. It didn't work out and this is why I didn't. So now I'm going to try it this way. And you that's how you that's how you build success.

That's how you become successful. And that's how you also stay resilient and positive. Um because those are also very very things things that you need a lot um in order to be a
founder because you have to have a ton of resilience. All right. Thank you all.

We're going to come back to closing thoughts from the panelists after the Q&A, but want to open up now um to some of your questions. And maybe the first one is a great one for Mika and Quaame, which is from Emma. Um how do founders balance designing for the specific community they know deeply while also building something scalable enough to reach millions? How do you hold that tension of depth and scale? Yeah, thank you Emma for your question.

Um so very early days and on the note of failure we designed a very rough prototype of uh first we started with a patientf facing app built in multiple languages. We've always been Medicaid first um and it was a very very rough prototype but what we did was we put together and it was for tracking biometrics. We pull like glucose levels, blood pressure etc. Um, and we built a mom council and we just set up a group on WhatsApp and it was literally just 10 women who were all pregnant and experiencing different, you know, either complications, high risk or just insured
by Medicaid. We set up a group and we literally just had this continuous feedback for cycle of putting out new, hey, what do you think of this?

Does this help? How do you actually track your meal? Do you take a picture? Um, you know, what are some of the apps you like Instagram? Let's make it like Instagram where you just take a picture.

I shouldn't say that. um but take a picture and have that loop. So it's just very easy to use and also hopefully delights the user. So um very rough prototype but from the beginning always incorporating that feedback to make sure that it what you develop actually addresses those needs and and will be used by the communities that you are
intending to serve. And today we have 50,000 women across the country using it.

Wow. But you start you start at 10. start with a little mom council of 10. I love that. I think um it's funny.

I love the sentiments and and it's it's funny. It just word of advice if healthc care world is really small. So be nice to everyone. Me and I worked together in the past and realized it when we came together to plan for this um this panel. Um ours started out as just a call.

We were volunteers that would meet people
in person. Then it was just a call center. So you would just call and talk to a person and they'll help you fill it out. And as and for us when you think about scale for me for millions, it gave us the time to learn what are the questions that people ask? What don't they understand about a Medicaid application or collect a prior authorization?

Do people even know what that is? Um, and we were able to slowly transition from a call center one service at a time because we got to take our time to understand how to make a a really great experience for the people
that needed it most. So, I have a question to add on to that. So, the question specifically asked scalable enough to reach millions. When you started this business, were you trying to make it scalable to meet to reach millions or how how did you both start that?

Yeah. So we started again from that that group of 10. And but was it in your mind like I want to reach millions or was it just I want to we wanted to solve a problem for a specific user. So and then how large that you know
market was was honestly debatable from the beginning. A lot of the VCs said hey this isn't a you know VC backable market um because it's a niche problem.

But we didn't believe that. We said, "Hey, this is a problem that affects We know that I I've experienced it. We know, you know, at least these 10 other women experience it." Um, and from Shadow, we worked with maternal fetal medicine specialists from Veryon. We knew that providers experience it as well as the total cost of care and payers experience it. And so, we had this kind of first little ecosystem where we knew and could
validate that problem.

And so, first we're just trying to create a solution that really addresses the needs of each stakeholder. And we figured if we could solve it there that this would have we would echo across and have ripple effect on the system. I'm laughing because no I had no I genuinely we did not plan to to do this. It was funny. My mom's here.

I remember I called her. I'm like you know um I think I'm going to do this full-time. She's like you sure? you know, um, so I I it's it's really when you think about we're we're
serving people and it's growing and it's the right thing to do and the and we went through accelerators that helped us learn how to take this thing and make it scalable because it really is something that you have to learn and know how to do. Um, and it and I think having mentors and being able to go through programs helped us build the bones of something that can be scalable so that now as we're doing it, we're able to do it and provide a really great outcome.

Yeah. The reason I asked that question because I feel like some of the best
companies and some of the best things comes from really wanting to solve a problem and not necessarily thinking about scale. like Riad Wreckit, we've seen a lot of especially out of outside of the country, we've seen a lot of uh women that are trying to solve problems just in their community and and healthcare just how it affects them and how it works for them. And I find those those answers quite interesting because you know what you build sometimes that becomes so authentic and it you know eventually it scales to millions. I there's lots of programs and things that
we use social media that just started just internally just to text someone upstairs or to tweet someone upstairs, you know, and then it became something much bigger.

So, I feel like sometimes when um you really have a a different goal and you just really want to succeed and you really have a great idea, it it becomes bigger and bigger and bigger and then like you said, Kwaami is like, "Oh, I I need to do this full-time." You know, this was never like the intention. I never started out wanting to win 23 grand slams. I wanted to win the US Open and then I made that scalable, you know,
going. All right. So, that's a good transition to uh Oh, where did that question just jump to?

Uh to you, Serena. A question from Jules. Um you've broken barriers in sports and investing. What advice would you give women building companies that challenge long-standing cultural stigma? Um, hey Jules, if you're still here.

Okay. Um, I what advice would I give to women
building companies um that are challenged longstanding cultural stigma? Um, I think stigmas and things like that people say are just ceilings that they put on you because they can't do it and they can't change it and they don't want it to change and they really like how things are and they don't want anything to be different. And so I feel like that's the whole meaning of that. And so I built my career um just basically around breaking that down.

I mean I'm from Compton but why why can't I be the best? that has nothing to do with playing
tennis. It literally has nothing to do with the saying. So when I'm the advice that I like to give people is is just say like don't listen to the noise. As simple as that may sound like block the noise because the people that are really making the noise aren't really making change or they're not doing anything different and they're mostly the people that are afraid to to be anything.

they're just hiding behind a computer or hiding behind a pen or whatever and trying to hold someone else down. They don't want you to be successful. So, that's kind of how I always view that. Um, there are so many good questions it kills me. But, we are going to move to closing thoughts so you guys can all get on to your days in Austin.

Um, Ryan, I'll start with you. Would love for just your your thoughts on in this moment, what gives you what makes you hopeful about health equity um in these challenging times that we're in? Yeah. I mean for me it's the power of partnerships and the inspiring stories you hear here. Uh when we think about what oops sorry uh when you think about and hear about what we can bring from wreckets to bring some of this brand building knowledge we have over the time the experience that acumen brings to the table of investing in entrepreneurs and
helping them thrive and grow to what Sabrina brings to Serena brings to the table through her experience and resiliency her investing exposure and all the broad expertise she has.

But the real power is when you match up that knowledge with that personal passion and that understanding of the audience they're trying to serve. And we talked a little bit earlier around how can you have impact? The impact comes from people with passion and people on the ground. And when you can surround them and support that, um, it really can create something bigger than the individual can on its own. One of the things that's always inspired me is a quote one of my mentors shared with me
early on, which is the idea of none of us is smarter than all of us.

And I love the statement because it's a little bit quirky, but it's definitively true. If the five of us worked on something collectively together, we will get to a better outcome than any one individual can do. So for me, it's really this power of partnership and what we're able to do with that to solve bigger problems together. Thank you. Yeah.

Um what gives me hope? I would say finding the silver linings. Um we're
living in I mentioned maternal health outcomes which is what we live and breathe every single day. Um unfortunately you know very low bar can't really get lower than than here. So there's only up but at the same time finding silver linings.

So we hear about you know cuts to funding in in Medicaid for example which is where we serve. Um but there are silver linings because hospitals that are stretched and budgets that are stretched and they need the technology now and there's a way to leverage. We're also at the precipice of this next AI revolution. There's a way
to use this technology for good and to supercharge the people who have that community- based trust like our in our case doulas um to do things that they could never do before and to enable hospitals to serve more of the safety net populations that they serve. Um, and so finding those silver silver linings and um, focusing on those, cutting out the noise, as Serena mentioned, um, continues to give me hope.

Um, I think about two things. one, this
is an example of organizations coming together to really focus on this problem and rise up some of the the people, the products um that are really solving the problem. Just already for us, we've been able to go to places, be in rooms and and earn partnerships that we could have never gotten on our own this quickly. That's one really big thing that we're that I'm seeing and something that's personally for us. We're building something that will allow anyone to be
able to access a nursing home, a a nursing home, health insurance, medications, etc.

without having to go through the system. And when we started this idea, the world wasn't really open to it. But now there's energy around making a better safety net, making one that's more accessible to more people. And that's really a a chasm shift that we're excited about. and me.

I'm just excited to be here, be on stage with everyone. I find these
founders so so exciting. Mika and I share a nickname on my my nickname is actually Ma. So, um I love what my nickname as well. Yeah.

I love what you guys are all doing. And I'm just so happy that Wreckit uh decided to, you know, work with me because I love I love doing this and I love, you know, getting on the ground and getting my elbows dirty. So, um I just look forward to seeing more in healthcare and uh more stuff with, you know, really great and helping. That's that's one thing I look forward to
doing. So, yeah.

Well, thank you to our amazing panelists and to all of you for joining us. hope that many of you will get involved and particularly want to hear from entrepreneurs who might be a fit for catalyst. You can reach out through Acumen America's website at the very top there's there's a note about Catalyst and would love for you to join us and get involved. Um to end where I started, we are in really challenging times as a country. But what gives me great hope are the builders who are relentlessly out there every day doing the work,
rolling up their sleeves and helping to make our communities healthier and more equitable.

Um and the partnership of of this whole group on the stage to do that together. So thank you and have an amazing rest of your time in Austin.

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*Source: stt · Language: en · Model: claude-opus-4-6*

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