How does an acquisition look like from a startup founder and investor perspective?

[00:00:01] Dear listeners, welcome to Faces of Digital Health, a podcast about digital health and how healthcare systems around the world adopt technology with me, Tjasa Zajc.

[00:00:18] The goal or the dream of every healthcare startup is to improve healthcare, but also have a sustainable business and sell a company or do an IPO.

[00:00:31] The path to that destination can be anything but easy though.

[00:00:36] So in today's discussion, you're going to listen a bit about strategic positioning for acquisitions in digital health, lessons from selling a healthcare company, the role of venture capitalists in supporting startups when it comes to acquisitions and IPOs and the advice for startups navigating the 2025 investment landscape.

[00:01:00] I spoke with David Buehler, a founding partner at Ascension Life Fund, who is also an exited founder of Avantech Healthcare, which was sold to Omnicel.

[00:01:12] So David has extensive personal experience with both raising and investing money in digital health.

[00:01:48] Enjoy the show.

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[00:02:03] So thank you for taking a minute or two to do that, even if it's just a sentence that gives us an insight into how you see the show.

[00:02:12] Thank you.

[00:02:14] Now let's dive in.

[00:02:27] David, hi, and thank you so much for joining me here on Faces of Digital Health to talk a little bit about the investment landscape, your experience as an entrepreneur who sold his company, and also your advice as a VC for startup in this year.

[00:02:46] A few episodes ago, I spoke with Mindy Simons from the NHS Innovation Accelerator, and I actually want to continue from that discussion.

[00:02:57] What are some of the creative strategies you've seen startups take in order to scale or get to an acquisition?

[00:03:05] So with Mindy, we talked about getting initial investments.

[00:03:09] And now I'm curious to hear from you about those last steps when you identify a buyer and when startups are mature enough to actually be sold to someone or bought by someone.

[00:03:23] Yeah, I think it starts a little bit before that in the sense that you need to be aware of what a potential acquirer or even frankly, what the company needs to look like and how you need to position yourself.

[00:03:35] When you get to that kind of exit stage, it really is very much about the, not only revenue, but margins and growth rates and customer retention, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:03:47] And so really being aware of what an acquirer is looking for is important when you get to that stage.

[00:03:53] Where do you see the role of VCs in the whole exit timeline?

[00:04:00] Do you see a role or is it all up to the founders?

[00:04:05] Yeah, I think it's critical that the VC is involved.

[00:04:08] And I've worked across early stage VC and current fund Kellers is a growth stage VC.

[00:04:14] So I think in terms of exit, even as a seed stage VC, you need to have some sense of what an exit looks like and who the potential acquirers would be in their capacity to acquire such a company.

[00:04:26] But when you're a growth stage investor, you really need to be tuned into this.

[00:04:29] You really need to understand because you're investing in that kind of final part of the journey.

[00:04:35] And some of the things I talked about there of positioning yourself and what an acquirer is looking for is that when we invest as a growth stage VC, you need to be working very closely with the company.

[00:04:46] It's almost like the milestones as you get to that stage are very much about positioning the company for being acquired.

[00:04:53] Therefore, a growth stage VC really needs to understand what that journey to exit is and who the potential acquirers are and work with the company through that process.

[00:05:02] Yeah, I love the fact that you actually had your own company, which was sold.

[00:05:09] So you were working on a hospital supplies and pharmacy automation system that was then acquired by a global corporation in the space.

[00:05:20] Can you talk a little bit about that?

[00:05:22] So your personal journey.

[00:05:25] First, how did you start the company?

[00:05:27] What were the biggest challenges and how long did it take for you to then sell it?

[00:05:32] Yes.

[00:05:33] Okay.

[00:05:34] So a start at the beginning, it was a pretty random entry into healthcare, actually, that I was working, actually running a mobile phone rental company for this big Swiss family office, almost operated like a private equity firm.

[00:05:48] And I'd gone off to university and come back and they had another company doing pay phones and patient entertainment systems in hospitals.

[00:05:58] And actually, I started working for them as a consultant, looking at the possibility of bringing these robotic drug dispensing systems and inventory management systems into the UK.

[00:06:08] And to cut a very long story short is that this family office that I was working as a consultant for had this big financial collapse.

[00:06:15] And so I was left halfway through this project wondering what to do and decided that I would take it on my own and set the company up and build it on my own.

[00:06:24] So that's where it started.

[00:06:26] How did you choose such a specific field as pharmacy automation and hospital supplies?

[00:06:32] Yeah, actually, it was a connection of someone.

[00:06:36] It was almost like a sort of family friends connection of someone that worked at a manufacturer of these systems in the US.

[00:06:44] So it was quite random like that.

[00:06:46] But what was interesting when we started to look at it was the real need for this in the UK.

[00:06:51] And in fact, these kind of pharmacy automation systems and inventory management systems had been used in the US for probably 20 years before.

[00:06:59] And in the UK, in the NHS, there were some very basic technologies that are starting to address some of these issues.

[00:07:06] So there was really an obvious market opportunity in the UK.

[00:07:11] Okay.

[00:07:12] Okay.

[00:07:12] And if we just go a step further in that startup journey, how did the whole process look like in terms of finding the buyer?

[00:07:25] How did you get in contact with them?

[00:07:28] What kind of due diligence did they do?

[00:07:31] Can you talk a little bit about that?

[00:07:34] Sure.

[00:07:34] Was this the acquisition of the company?

[00:07:37] Yes, exactly.

[00:07:38] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:07:39] It's interesting to see what was your experience like as the one that was trying to convince the buyer to get the interest in the company.

[00:07:51] And I'm sure that experience had an impact on you as a VC now.

[00:07:56] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:07:57] I think this was probably a little unique in as much that the supplier we'd worked with from the beginning that was based in the US.

[00:08:05] So they were one of the major suppliers of some of the systems that we sold to the NHS were the eventual acquirers of the company.

[00:08:14] So in this particular case that we'd had a relationship for many years and then really understood the strategic fit for them.

[00:08:23] That was kind of a good way in.

[00:08:25] But I suppose if you look at it from other companies' perspective is that, yeah, it is about understanding where there is a strategic fit and alignment with a potential acquirer.

[00:08:34] And in this case is that this really fitted with their international and expansion strategy and therefore adding buying distributors that had already built a big market presence and established the product market fit in a new country was really as part of their kind of global expansion plans.

[00:08:57] Yeah, I guess I can understand that because it's hard to enter the UK market and the NHS.

[00:09:05] And with this acquisition you were a good entry point for them to start the market.

[00:09:10] Do you still follow what happened to the product?

[00:09:15] Because sometimes with these acquisitions it's either you buy the talent or you buy the technology.

[00:09:21] So I'm wondering what happened in this case.

[00:09:25] Yes, yeah, I keep in regular contact with some of my team that are still working there.

[00:09:31] And yeah, the company is going from strength to strength.

[00:09:34] So clearly it's now under the kind of branding and umbrella of the OmniCell who acquired us and are now just part of their global brand.

[00:09:42] But it's still a major supplier, probably the leading supplier of automation and venture management systems to the NHS.

[00:09:49] Yeah, that's always good to see it continue like that.

[00:09:52] And we also did some product and software development that we created in the UK.

[00:09:59] And then those products have also been included in the wider product portfolio across the international company.

[00:10:06] So that's nice to see as well.

[00:10:09] One thing that we don't really talk about that often when it comes to acquisitions and VCs is the due diligence process.

[00:10:21] So I wanted to take the opportunity to highlight that as well a little bit.

[00:10:26] So how do you do due diligence when you look at startups?

[00:10:30] How did the due diligence look like in your specific example?

[00:10:36] Yeah, so I might start with the due diligence on my company because that was the big good forming ground for what I do as a VC.

[00:10:45] Yeah, so it's pretty brutal really.

[00:10:47] We have a team of the M&A team and finance team from the American companies coming over, spending several days with us,

[00:10:55] trawling through every account, every financial information, all the paperwork, customer contracts, meeting customers, meeting the staff.

[00:11:04] So, yeah, it's a pretty intense process.

[00:11:07] Yeah, people should certainly be prepared for what is coming.

[00:11:11] Stressed.

[00:11:12] Yeah, maybe a little bit.

[00:11:13] Yeah, because it is.

[00:11:14] There's a lot of work and then your exits and potentially large financial reward is all hanging off the back of this.

[00:11:21] So it's quite a stressful time.

[00:11:23] And what also happens during due diligence as well is ultimately, you know, there's this drives towards the final negotiation and terms for the acquisition.

[00:11:34] Once it's really understood about the they've got to fully understand what they perceive as the value of the true value of the company and the potential of the company.

[00:11:44] Negotiations really get started.

[00:11:46] Do you, as a VC, have a preference for a company to get acquired or the company going public?

[00:11:55] And the reason I'm asking this is because a few years ago what started to be popular were the specs, so special acquisition just clusters.

[00:12:07] And 23andMe did an IPO in that way.

[00:12:12] And ever since they are a public company, they are struggling quite a lot for various reasons.

[00:12:19] But what was interesting to me when I was reading an interview with the founder, Anne Wojcicki, was when she said that it's really difficult when every move you make has such a substantial impact on the value of the company.

[00:12:37] And I just want to hear your thoughts about acquisitions versus IPOs versus not going public.

[00:12:45] And how do healthcare startups and companies tackle that, deal with that, given that you rarely have huge returns on investments after the IPOs in healthcare?

[00:13:00] Because it's such a slow moving process.

[00:13:04] Yeah.

[00:13:05] Yeah.

[00:13:05] Okay.

[00:13:05] Let me tackle some different aspects of that.

[00:13:07] Yeah.

[00:13:07] It's a really interesting question because there are so many sort of sides to that.

[00:13:11] I suppose that you could argue as a VC investor that if one of your companies was acquired for a few hundred million or IPO for a few hundred million or a billion, that's going to be a successful outcome.

[00:13:24] So you might not care too much.

[00:13:25] That's one aspect.

[00:13:27] But then, yeah, there is, there's also the change, I would say, over the last kind of decade or so of companies that are IPOing, that there's so much money in private markets now that the IPO threshold has changed dramatically, which has also changed the exit horizon for VCs.

[00:13:48] If you look at maybe 20 years ago or something, companies, it was normal to go public for a hundred or $200 million or something.

[00:13:55] And now, frankly, unless you're doing a billion, there are slight differences in early stage biotech.

[00:14:02] But generally speaking, an IPO these days is a billion-dollar-plus affair, but that also reflects the longer time to that and the longer hold in private hands, in private investors, typically VC and PE.

[00:14:18] Then there's the question of, yeah, what does it look like after IPO?

[00:14:22] I think it depends on the company.

[00:14:24] I mean, first to sort of address your SPAC point, I think, you know, Armors like to ignore SPACs as an IPO because, in essence, that they just continued the self-fulfilling prophecy of VC up rounds.

[00:14:37] And normally where you would get a public market reckoning and valuation, which in theory should reflect the true value of a company, was essentially just a continuation of the VC process and just allowing these overvalued companies to go public.

[00:14:52] And then, of course, what's going to happen?

[00:14:54] They're going to come crashing down, just like many company valuations did in 2022.

[00:15:01] And then with regard to more generally after IPO, that, yeah, what you would like to see really is that the – I think people have come to see the IPO as the end, the liquidity event, the exit.

[00:15:15] But really, you would like to think that the IPO is the start of the next growth journey and being able to attract more funding and give them more opportunities for growth.

[00:15:28] That is what you would like to see.

[00:15:29] So then it comes back to a little bit of, yeah, did companies go public at the right time?

[00:15:35] And you're seeing these crashes in valuations.

[00:15:37] Yeah.

[00:15:37] Was it through SPACs?

[00:15:38] Was it – there's a lot of things going on there in the sort of 2021 period that probably don't necessarily reflect what one would typically expect from an IPO and the future trajectory of the company beyond that.

[00:15:54] When you were still in a company, you had to struggle with getting new customers, with scaling.

[00:16:03] And I wonder how do you look on those struggles now as a VC when you work with the companies that you invest in?

[00:16:15] Yeah, let's just dive into that a little bit.

[00:16:19] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:16:20] I think, again, it's great experience to have having done that right at the kind of coalface and understand the journey, particularly for me in healthcare.

[00:16:30] I think there was a bit of an internal joke on our investment committee that I was like the sort of the grim reaper when it came to companies selling to healthcare and the NHS because I was aware of the journey.

[00:16:42] And a lot of these companies didn't quite understand what was ahead of them in terms of the kind of the time and the cost and the work you have to do to get a new product or service implemented.

[00:16:56] Well, it's not just the NHS or within any healthcare system.

[00:16:59] So it's really good to have that kind of knowledge.

[00:17:01] And I think the thing there in terms of acquiring healthcare customers is that you really need to understand the drivers, particularly in clinical practice or even in operational workflow or anything, and really understand what it takes to change those.

[00:17:19] And we've invested in a lot of companies that are selling treatments or diagnostics that need to fit into the care pathway or treatment pathway.

[00:17:30] And you need to understand that is not just a case of turning up and making a sale, that you need to convince the key opinion leaders of this new clinical practice and bring them over the line.

[00:17:46] So a lot of work actually goes into kind of building up this knowledge base and support from a kind of clinical perspective before you can really get any traction from a purchase and procurement perspective.

[00:18:00] I keep thinking what the company did.

[00:18:02] So working in the pharmacy stock management system and the requirement to have the clinical buy-in, the buy-in from pharmacists in your case, I assume.

[00:18:14] And I wonder how do you look at the whole landscape of companies that replaced manual processes versus companies that are trying to do existing things better.

[00:18:30] So for example, when today there's a lot of pharmacy systems on the market.

[00:18:36] And if you want it to scale, you might need to replace something that's already there and customers might not be happy with.

[00:18:44] But as Anne Forsyth from Canada said in one of the previous episodes, it's really difficult to change the workflows when a lot of people are already using them.

[00:18:59] Even if the workflow is super inefficient, just because people are already used to them, you need to have that change management perspective and the whole implementation journey in order to succeed.

[00:19:13] What was the case in your example?

[00:19:16] And what does this whole experience mean for your involvement with startups?

[00:19:22] Are you just more understanding just because you had this experience?

[00:19:27] Yeah, just that.

[00:19:29] Yeah, so some of those points there are the journey I went through.

[00:19:33] And yeah, starting off with it's important not to try and automate a bad process or a bad system.

[00:19:40] So you want to be looking at these things with a fresh pair of eyes and making sure that this is really going to deliver change and improvement.

[00:19:47] But then to your other point, change management is critical.

[00:19:52] And actually that once we had sold a system and convinced ours was very much about procurement and finance benefits,

[00:20:01] as well as some in kind of patient safety and such,

[00:20:05] often that this was procured as a operational and cost saving investment.

[00:20:10] And then because it's used at the sort of clinical front end in wards, operating rooms and such is that the clinical staff are using the inventory and the medicine.

[00:20:22] Whatever decisions have been made by procurement and finance,

[00:20:25] if the clinicians don't buy into this and use it properly, then it's never going to work.

[00:20:29] So yeah, the implementation was absolutely critical and the change management.

[00:20:34] And we learned so much doing that in different hospitals, in different departments within the hospital.

[00:20:40] And it's absolutely critical to get it right.

[00:20:43] And sometimes it's about looking at the clinical workflow.

[00:20:46] Sometimes it's just about buying lunch and chocolates with the clinical staff

[00:20:50] and just having them engage in the process and get their opinion and buy in and just understanding what it's all about.

[00:20:56] Because particularly what we were doing is inventory management of drugs and supplies.

[00:21:02] It's not really on clinicians' radar that they want these supplies and medications for the patient.

[00:21:08] That is their number one priority, which is fair enough.

[00:21:10] And so making them understand the reason for doing this is the fact that a typical hospital will spend somewhere between 100 and 200 million a year on these drugs and supplies.

[00:21:20] And it's critical to have some sense of control and understanding the usage in order to manage that 200 million a year of spend.

[00:21:30] And once people start to understand that, then they start to buy into the whole journey of the implementation and the change management and using it properly.

[00:21:39] And I think I've forgotten the final part of your...

[00:21:42] I think about the startups in terms of how...

[00:21:45] Yeah, so I think that then gives me that kind of understanding of the journey and the struggles and can help them.

[00:21:52] So I think it's important that startups understand that journey ahead and the struggles, but we're there to support them.

[00:21:59] And the thing is, as well, I guess we're, as VCs, we're not sitting there trying not to invest in stuff.

[00:22:06] If there's a new exciting technology that's going to transform healthcare, this is an amazing thing.

[00:22:11] And we actually want to look at ways we can make it work and support these companies and make sure they're heading on the right path.

[00:22:18] And they understand that path in terms of time and costs and what they should be doing.

[00:22:23] And what are the most important technologies in development at the moment for healthcare?

[00:22:30] I know this is a very broad question because you might have your own specific investment focus.

[00:22:36] So what do you invest in?

[00:22:38] And based on that, where do you see the biggest potential in healthcare?

[00:22:46] It's easy from the founder's perspective to see the problem you're solving as the most important problem that...

[00:22:52] Healthcare has, but there's a lot of challenges that we are trying to address with technology.

[00:22:58] No, absolutely.

[00:23:00] And I think what's exciting is almost every aspect of healthcare and drug discovery.

[00:23:06] There is a new technology that's helping some part of the process.

[00:23:10] And that's absolutely the amazing thing.

[00:23:12] From an investor's perspective, we are looking at transformative technologies that are going to become the gold standard or the standard of care.

[00:23:22] Within healthcare and R&D, so essentially drug discovery and clinical trials.

[00:23:28] So that's where we're focused as an investor.

[00:23:31] And we focus on that because in terms of the large and relatively consistent budgets in pharma budgets in drug discovery and clinical trials.

[00:23:43] So we are sure that there is a long-term customer base there.

[00:23:48] And then similarly within healthcare, where something can become part of the standard of care embedded in the kind of treatment pathway and potentially attract reimbursement.

[00:24:01] So again, we're very much looking at knowing that there is a solid market opportunity and consistent market opportunity for these technologies.

[00:24:10] In terms of the actual technologies.

[00:24:13] So we invest across kind of three pillars.

[00:24:17] One is R&D, so the drug discovery and clinical trials.

[00:24:20] And then another one, which is patient care, which includes technology in acute care and chronic care.

[00:24:27] And then the third sector, which is diagnostics, which includes AI imaging and AI diagnostics.

[00:24:34] Within those, there's clearly some exciting stuff.

[00:24:38] I think for me, what's really exciting is, I mean, a couple of areas that I would highlight.

[00:24:43] One is the AI and drug discovery.

[00:24:46] And I think there's been a lot of hype on this.

[00:24:48] And we've seen a lot of companies come and go or hit huge valuations and crash down.

[00:24:53] But the reality is that AI is underpinning pretty much all drug discovery now.

[00:24:58] And this is leading to huge opportunities.

[00:25:00] It's very much an exciting journey ahead.

[00:25:03] And it's in terms of whether it's target discovery or candid discovery or being able to look at toxicity or screening or even disease-specific and patient-specific elements within the drug discovery process.

[00:25:20] And what that can lead to in terms of the timeline of bringing new drugs to market and also the ability to tackle new diseases and become more personalized.

[00:25:29] That is super exciting.

[00:25:32] And then just the other area I think is super exciting is AI diagnostics and within that kind of imaging as well.

[00:25:38] And there, I think what is exciting is not only, I think at its base level, it's able to automate what the human is able to do at the moment.

[00:25:46] But I think where it's heading and has already achieved this in some cases is what it can do in terms of diagnostics and predict disease in terms of understand what has never been possible before by picking up relationships and patterns in data and imaging.

[00:26:04] And being able to predict and being able to predict and screen for disease before you're even looking at what would have traditionally been in an image or something and making a diagnosis often too late.

[00:26:18] And given the current investment landscape, the excitement and the amount of money that companies can get, all that has subsided compared to the last few years.

[00:26:31] How do you look at that as an investor?

[00:26:34] Are you worried for your companies?

[00:26:37] Do you need to fund additional rounds yourself?

[00:26:41] How does that impact you?

[00:26:46] Yeah, I think there are several different elements to that.

[00:26:50] I think that, yeah, if we just look at some of our existing companies, I would say that this is probably across the board in VC is that where companies are achieving milestones and making progress, there has continued to be funding available for them.

[00:27:04] That is not an area of concern, but it also points to the importance of focus on achieving milestones.

[00:27:11] And within health tech and life science, often those milestones are not just about kind of revenue.

[00:27:19] They are about kind of regulatory milestones and R&D milestones, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:27:24] So yeah, definitely a focus on that.

[00:27:26] Yeah, I think I have, it is a struggle for companies that are taking longer to achieve those milestones.

[00:27:36] Therefore, I can't really go back to investors and say, we have achieved X, Y, Z, we're ready to erase our next round.

[00:27:43] They're needing to raise almost like bridge rounds.

[00:27:47] But even that, to some degree, I think that a lot of funds in this time over the last couple of years have become a little kind of temporarily inward looking and making sure that companies in their portfolios are looked after.

[00:28:00] So actually, I've yet to see a company that I'm connecting with that has not been able to survive the journey.

[00:28:08] A combination of cutting costs and focusing on the right milestones as well as achieving bridge rounds has all been relatively successful for those companies.

[00:28:20] So that's good to see.

[00:28:23] Yeah, yeah.

[00:28:24] Success is always welcome, I guess.

[00:28:26] What's your advice for digital health startups in 2025?

[00:28:32] And similarly, do you have any advice for customers and buyers?

[00:28:38] Like, how do you look at what's coming up next?

[00:28:42] I guess as a VC, you need to do that a little bit more than just a regular consumer.

[00:28:49] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:28:50] I think with regard to advice for companies in 2025, I'm sure many companies have felt the pinch and even companies that have survived very well through this period that a lot of them have retracted into kind of the profitable and slowing growth, etc., etc.

[00:29:08] Many people are waiting for the sort of taps to turn back on, if you like.

[00:29:13] And I guess the first thing is don't expect them to turn back on to the sort of crazy times of 2021.

[00:29:19] But we should be soon getting back to a more normal environment.

[00:29:22] But I think it will be a kind of, it is and will continue to be a new world where there is focus on achieving milestones that add value in terms of advice to companies.

[00:29:34] Make sure you're really focused on that, particularly in health tech companies, whether that's R&D, regulatory, market entry, pharma, new implementations or trials in hospitals, whatever it happens to be.

[00:29:45] Make sure you're achieving concrete milestones and really think in that sense, because VCs are going to be very focused on that.

[00:29:56] In fact, all the way through to M&A, there's not only milestones for this round that you're looking to raise next, but in essence, that round you're raising next is going to give you the funding to achieve the next set of milestones.

[00:30:07] So make sure you're very clear in articulating what that set of milestones are all the way through the journey of different funding rounds.

[00:30:16] Are the companies that you invest in only from the UK?

[00:30:20] How diverse is the portfolio and what are your experiences in different markets?

[00:30:26] Do you observe any differences from the development point of view and how fast companies can grow?

[00:30:35] Yeah, I guess my experience that I did most of my early angel investing in the US and then partner with the Ascension Life Fund here in the UK and all of those investments are UK investments.

[00:30:48] And then now partner with Keles and we're just launching that fund.

[00:30:52] So we'll be making investments later in the year, but that is a European wide fund.

[00:30:57] So I've got the oversight, if you like, of US, UK and Europe.

[00:31:04] And look, I think the US always has deeper pockets for two reasons.

[00:31:12] One is that the ecosystem is just there.

[00:31:15] Therefore, valuations throughout the lifecycle are higher and all the way through to the IPO, for example.

[00:31:24] Just the ecosystem, so the investor base is there, even the analysts and everything.

[00:31:29] So it just drives the activity and drives up the valuations.

[00:31:33] Similarly, there is one fact about the US in terms of valuations is your scalability.

[00:31:41] If you look, then this is a difference and something the UK and European companies need to think and focus on.

[00:31:48] And even the governments and the VC ecosystem, because your ability to scale in the US is so much easier to reach a population with whatever, 350 million people, but in one single country.

[00:32:04] Yes, there are slight differences, minor differences between states and such.

[00:32:08] But essentially, you can scale your company across the US much, much easier and quicker without ever leaving the country kind of thing or probably even your office.

[00:32:18] Whereas if you look at the reality on the ground in the UK and Europe is that, yes, for example, you scale in the UK.

[00:32:25] But then to go into France, Germany, wherever is that you've got everything from kind of language differences to different health care systems and funding and different providers, etc, etc.

[00:32:38] Even if you might think that European Union is a sort of single entity, the reality is that you've got a whole multitude of different languages and healthcare system reimbursement, everything.

[00:32:50] And they're all going to be using different technologies.

[00:32:52] And yeah, this is the pain.

[00:32:56] That is a good way of putting it.

[00:32:58] Pain in Europe.

[00:33:00] Yeah, but I think one of the things we're trying to work on with the fund is really helping overcome those barriers.

[00:33:05] Because the thing is that although there are clearly challenges and the pain is there, is that there is an opportunity.

[00:33:13] There's a similar amount of people in Europe and there's massive opportunities for these companies.

[00:33:18] So this is one of the things we're trying to leverage as an investor and support companies, particularly with our experience and our network across Europe,

[00:33:24] is help companies grow beyond borders in Europe.

[00:33:32] Very briefly, what kind of companies are you going to be looking for?

[00:33:36] I'm sure this is going to be a valuable piece of information for many listeners.

[00:33:42] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:33:43] Firstly, it goes back to those three segments I talked about earlier.

[00:33:46] We've got the R&D, which includes AI drug discovery and clinical trial or digitized clinical trials technology, if you like.

[00:33:54] And then technology in acute care and chronic care, particularly remote monitoring and automated wards and systems in hospitals.

[00:34:03] And then AI imaging and diagnostics and data-enabled medtech.

[00:34:09] So they're the kind of core segments.

[00:34:11] And then what we're looking for, we're a growth stage investor.

[00:34:14] So we are looking at our sweet spot really is series A, B and C.

[00:34:19] And across Europe, we're investing across Europe and the UK.

[00:34:23] And what we're really looking for is companies at this scale inflection point where they've probably reached one regulatory hurdle in one country,

[00:34:33] probably have a product in market in one healthcare system or have some pharma partnerships in place.

[00:34:39] And they're at that scaling inflection point to scale across Europe and or globally.

[00:34:46] David, thank you so much for all the insights that you shared today and good luck with the new fund.

[00:34:52] Thank you very much indeed.

[00:34:53] It's been a pleasure talking to you.

[00:34:54] Thank you.