The Launchpad Edition: Issue #4

Welcome to another Launchpad Edition!. Every other Sunday, I’ll share curated resources: the news, roles at companies, opportunities and events shaping innovation across social impact and healthcare I think are worth your time. If there’s something you’d love to see included, respond and let me know what would be most valuable to you for future issues. I also like to share Linkedin URLs since the posts have alot more context, especially for job opportunities

In the Know

A Drug Story podcast launches — Thomas Goetz, former Executive Editor at WIRED, is launching a podcast that examines a critical tension in modern healthcare: drugs treat symptoms, but rarely address root causes. Each episode will use a single prescription drug as a lens to explore the broader business of disease. This matters because it surfaces questions about how we’ve structured healthcare around management rather than prevention, and whether pharmaceutical solutions are obscuring the systemic changes we need to create lasting health. Launches January 6, 2026.

Inside Pivotal Ventures’ $5 Billion Bet On Women’s Futures — Melinda French Gates’ Pivotal Ventures recently announced 80+ organizations receiving between $1-5 million through its $250 million Action for Women’s Health global open call. This represents a fundamental reframing of philanthropic capital deployment: rather than invitation-only decision-making, Pivotal used an open call with peer review to identify organizations historically excluded from major funding. The approach signals that addressing women’s health gaps requires not just more funding, but fundamentally different funding mechanisms that center equity and proximity to the problem.

How SiriusXM Saved Over $2 Million While Improving Family-Building Care — Carrot Fertility’s case study with SiriusXM demonstrates something that benefits leaders often struggle to articulate: comprehensive fertility benefits can simultaneously improve outcomes and reduce costs. Through clinical engagement that steers members toward appropriate alternatives to IVF when possible, promotes single-embryo transfers, and supports genetic testing, SiriusXM achieved a 24% increase in pregnancy rates while avoiding $2.15 million in downstream costs. The data reveals an often-overlooked insight about employer healthcare strategy: preventive, specialized care that meets people earlier in their journey can avert the expensive complications that emerge from fragmented, reactive approaches.

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Roles Worth Exploring

Director, Global Health Equity & Delivery (Americas), Johnson & Johnson — Hybrid, New Jersey

Chief of Staff, Everycure — Philadelphia

Chief People and Culture Officer, Make a Wish Foundation — Remote

Head of Communications, Omidyar Network — San Francisco

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Spotlights & Opportunities

Alerje’s Autoinjector Platform Acquired by Sempresto — my longtime friend and collaborator, Javier Evelyn, CEO of Alerje, recently announced that his company’s smartphone-integrated autoinjector platform has been acquired by medical device company Sempresto. The acquisition is significant because it addresses a persistent gap in emergency allergy care: nearly two-thirds of severe allergy patients arriving at emergency departments haven’t used their epinephrine autoinjector, often because traditional devices are bulky and easy to forget. By integrating with smartphones—the one device people rarely leave behind—this technology could fundamentally shift emergency preparedness.

Kismet Health Acquired by Kooth — Co-founders Cierra Gromoff and Christie Sander built Kismet Health from a shared conviction that virtual care platforms needed to be designed for healthcare, not repurposed from business tools. Their acquisition by Kooth, an international mental health leader serving millions through state and government programs globally, represents validation that developmentally appropriate, provider-centered telehealth can scale without sacrificing quality. With Kooth’s global infrastructure, the platform can now reach international scale at a moment when mental health demand is surging while provider availability declines.

How Ashley Boyd Reached Nearly 1 Million Women Through Reddit — another longtime friend and collaborator in digital health, Ashley Boyd, who leads marketing at DiabetesSisters, partnered with the DECIDE Study and maternal-fetal medicine expert Dr. Kartik Venkatesh to host a Reddit AMA about gestational diabetes. The campaign reached nearly 1 million women and significantly outperformed health outreach benchmarks—demonstrating that meeting people where they already gather, with expert-led discussions in anonymous spaces, can drive meaningful engagement around stigmatized health topics. Boyd’s case study offers practical insights for organizations seeking to reach women affected by conditions that are common but often feel isolating.

What I’m Reading

I’ve started reading Manifesto for a Moral Revolution by Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO of Acumen Fund. Years ago while I was living in Washington DC, I read her book The Blue Sweater, which immersed me into the world of social impact and global needs. Novogratz challenges conventional approaches to solving poverty and inequality, arguing for a shift from transactional charity to patient capital and moral leadership that centers dignity and accompaniment. Her framework—built from decades deploying investment capital in overlooked markets—offers a compelling counter-narrative to both traditional aid models and purely profit-driven impact investing. As I’m building at the intersection of health, social impact and capital, this has become a timely read.

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As always, I’m curious: What’s catching your attention? What are you working on? What opportunities or insights have crossed your path lately that deserve more attention?

Let’s keep the conversation going.