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Founder, Managing Partner of Oncology Ventures
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Ben Freeberg shared thisPeople have said this month's comedy bit is "pretty funny for a cancer newsletter." We also cover: 1. Highlights from the World Health Organization's 2026 Report on Cancer 2. John Hinshaw and Blackbird Vineyards' generous $50k donation to the American Cancer Society 3. Oncology Ventures was accepted to RAISE Global out of 900+ applicants. If you are in SF 10/21-10/23 let us know https://lnkd.in/gBy9hw9kOncology Ventures: World Health Organization's 2026 Report on Cancer + Comedy About NamesOncology Ventures: World Health Organization's 2026 Report on Cancer + Comedy About Names
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Ben Freeberg shared thisCancer centers receive 200+ start-up pitches a year. Their budget, if they are fortunate, allows them to partner with five of them. This month's Oncology Ventures Substack dives into: 1. A working playbook for funding cancer innovation. 2. Comedy, as always. 3. An offer: For the first time ever, I'm opening sponsorship on this newsletter that reaches 17,500+ healthcare executives, VCs, LPs and more across 86 countries. We are making $0 on it. Every cent goes toward two things I care about - increasing donations to cancer charities and building a real community around oncology innovation. → 50% goes directly to one of our favorite cancer charities → 50% funds a private dinner in the city of your choice, where you will sit alongside our portfolio company CEOs, healthcare executives and our LPs → And you get a feature from me, in front of 17,500 of the most targeted readers in oncology innovation DM me if you want to learn more. We have four slots. Full issue here: https://lnkd.in/gUB_arKcOncology Ventures: A Working Playbook for Funding Cancer Innovation + ComedyOncology Ventures: A Working Playbook for Funding Cancer Innovation + Comedy
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Ben Freeberg reposted thisBen Freeberg reposted thisIn the latest episode of Funded, we sat down with Ben Freeberg, Founder and Managing Partner of Oncology Ventures, a seed-stage fund investing in data and infrastructure startups transforming cancer care. Ben came to this work from three angles: trained VC, former operator at a cancer startup, and a Stage 3 cancer survivor. That combination shapes everything about how he evaluates companies and what he looks for in founders. Here's what we covered: • Why more than half of the 1,700 cancer deaths in the US every day are preventable with technology that already exists • How he built a LP base where his investors are also his most important customers • Why commercialization clarity is the number one thing that kills deals in his pipeline Watch the full video: https://lnkd.in/ggEEaBy6
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Ben Freeberg reposted thisWhat a night. Getting leaders in a room to talk about how we can make cancer care better and chat New York Giants football at DisneyWorld? Doesn't get much better than that! Grateful to have Mark Herzlich share his cancer journey with us. Special thanks to Ben Freeberg and Oncology Ventures for cosponsoring the event. #DaymarklovesCOA Justin Bekelman,Ryan Liefer, Rohini Rajgopal, Roy Beveridge MD, Paul Dufault, Angela TaberBen Freeberg reposted thisLast night, Daymark hosted community oncologists, clinicians, and cancer experts for happy hour and fireworks at #COA, the Community Oncology Alliance conference. Conversations were flowing, bonds were made, and we had the chance to connect with this incredibly special group of thought leaders, innovators, and practitioners. We were glad to have VIP guest Mark Herzlich, former NFL linebacker for the NY Giants, who defeated Ewing’s sarcoma in 2009. He shared his experience of what it was actually like — navigating chemotherapy and radiation, managing side effects, coordinating care — with a room full of people working to change exactly that experience. Plus, Jonathan Rhodes got to try on his Super Bowl XLVI ring, so we’d say the night was a success. Mark said it best: “If I’d had people to pick up the phone and call for help during my cancer journey, that would’ve been huge for me. The future of cancer care isn’t just improving the treatment process but also the support system that exists around patients.” We couldn’t agree more. Sharing some photos from the event (and fireworks 🎇) below. Thanks to our co-host Ben Freeberg at Oncology Ventures. If you were there, please say hello in the comments! #communityoncologyalliance
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Ben Freeberg reposted thisBen Freeberg reposted this1,000 of the 1,700 Americans who die of cancer every day don't have to. Blake Madden sat down with two operators who are actually building something about that. Ben Freeberg, founder of Oncology Ventures, and Dan Nardi, CEO of Reimagine Care, join the latest episode of Claims Denied to talk about why the cancer care gap persists and what it will take to close it. The number that frames everything: 97% of the cancer journey happens outside the clinic. Almost nobody is building for it. Dan breaks down how Remy, Reimagine's AI-based virtual cancer center, is resolving half of all patient interactions autonomously while cutting ED visits by 67%. Blake also pushes him on the drug-distributor vertical integration question - the one most operators won't answer on the record. Ben lays out his thesis: life insurance as a new buyer, outpatient CAR-T, and the coming consolidation wave in digital oncology. If you want to track where oncology care delivery is actually headed over the next 3-5 years, this episode is for you. Listen to the episode with the link in the comments.
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Ben Freeberg posted thisToday we announced our $62M oversubscribed Fund II, anchored by Texas Oncology and backed by the most influential institutions in cancer care. This is nearly double the size of our $32M Fund I and surpassing our $50M target. Thank you to all of our Limited Partners for supporting us and our mission to improve cancer care. Oncology Ventures Fund II is backed by institutions who collectively treat 1 in 3 cancer patients in the U.S. Texas Oncology, Moffitt Cancer Center, Fred Hutch Patient Care, City of Hope, Atlantic Health, Astera Cancer Care, Cardinal Health, Ohio State University Physicians And thank you to our incredible portfolio companies for doing the hard work every day to make cancer care affordable, efficient and accessible. Triomics, Kadance, Inc., Concr, Gabbi, IgniteData, mPATH Health, OncoveryCare, Reimagine Care, RISA, Health Universe, Tono Health, BIOMAKERS, Daymark Health, One Health Company, Lumonus, SpotDoc, WellBeam Inc, NexCure, Inc., CancerNavigator, Stitch The opportunity and the urgency are clear. Cancer is the #1 cost driver for large employers and health plans. It's a $225B market growing at 12% annually. And 42% of cancer patients still exhaust their life savings paying for care. 1,700 Americans die of cancer every day. Research shows more than 1,000 of those deaths are preventable with earlier detection, better navigation, and guideline-based treatment. We are actively searching for our next investment. If you're building something that belongs in our portfolio, or know someone who is, we’d love to connect. Full press release in the comments.
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Ben Freeberg shared thisGreat to share the stage at this year's Berkley Accident and Health (a Berkley Company)'s Captive Symposium with Vani Hari and Nick Buettner. Captive plans are uniquely positioned to move beyond reactive care and take action to improve cancer care today. Oncology Ventures' port cos are built exactly for buyers like the ones in that room: 🎗️CancerNavigator - 1:1 oncology nurse navigation from diagnosis through treatment 🫁 mPATH Health - lung cancer screening for the 90% of eligible Americans who never get screened 🧬 Gabbi - 2-minute hereditary breast cancer risk assessment with same-day clinical follow-up 🔬 SpotDoc - full-body AI skin cancer imaging, one-second scan, same-day results 🏥 Reimagine Care - virtual + in-home cancer care that cuts ER visits and total cost 🧬 Kadance, Inc. - genomics-based cancer risk testing baked directly into life insurance benefits design 💪 OncoveryCare - survivorship care for 18M+ Americans with limited post-treatment support 🩺 Tono Health - virtual oncodermatology keeping patients on life-saving treatments longer If you're designing or managing a captive plan and want to talk to any of those companies, let me know.Ben Freeberg shared thisWe are feeling connected and inspired as we roll into day two of sessions at the Berkley Captive Symposium. With this year’s theme, Blueprints for Better Living, the conversations around wellness and proactive health strategies are well underway. We wanted to thank yesterday's keynote speaker, Vani Hari, and featured speakers, Nick Buettner and Ben Freeberg, for their sessions, which motivated and engaged our attendees. We're looking forward to another day of cutting-edge insights and member engagement. #berkleycaptivesymposium #groupcaptives #selffunding
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Ben Freeberg reposted thisBen Freeberg reposted thisRemi is not a standalone chatbot. It is our AI agent designed to work alongside clinicians. AI is becoming a common place people turn for health advice, and that matters. A recent New York Times article highlighted new research showing that ChatGPT-style AI tools are often no better than Google when it comes to guiding medical decisions. In real-world scenarios, users identified the correct condition only about a third of the time and chose the right next step less than half the time. The takeaway is not that AI has no role in healthcare. It is that AI without clinical judgment is incomplete. Clinical care is messy. Context is often incomplete. Knowing which details matter, and which do not, is a skill clinicians develop through training and experience, not prompts. That is exactly why Remi was built differently. At Reimagine Care, Remi is AI with humans in the loop: • Clinicians guide interpretation and escalation • Context is actively shaped, not assumed • AI supports speed and scale, not decision-making in isolation Responsible AI in healthcare is not about replacing clinicians. It is about combining technology and clinical judgment to drive safer, more actionable care for patients. That is the future we are building. ⏩ Scroll through to learn more. Link to the NYT article referenced: https://lnkd.in/eMxNdATE Learn more about Remi by visiting our website: https://lnkd.in/gu9A7mCj
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Ben Freeberg reposted thisToday, we're announcing our $6,000,000 seed round, led by Kleiner Perkins and supported by existing investors, Susa Ventures, Twelve Below, and Oncology Ventures. $6M seed round, $9.5M total raised. But the number that actually keeps me motivated: 9 months to 7.5 days. That's what Duke Clinical Research Institute did with Health Universe — took a clinical trial setup process that typically runs 9 to 10 months and ran it in 7.5 days. That's not a demo. That's what happens when AI infrastructure is done right. And we've been summarizing complex cancer cases so that oncologists can get up to speed quickly, when speed and accuracy mean the difference between life and death. Our clinical trials matching algorithm outperforms state of the art benchmarks like TrialsGPT. It's great to raise money, but what matters is that we are changing healthcare and delivering better outcomes for patients. What we've built is a secure, HIPAA compliant, ONC-certified workspace where Academic Medical Centers, health systems, pharma and others, can deploy custom AI agents against real patient data — pulled in through TEFCA — with the governance, observability, and human-in-the-loop controls that clinical environments actually require. 170M+ documents processed. Agents deployed in days, not months or years. This is healthcare for the 21st century. And we're multi-tenant, so organizations can share documents across workspaces and let agents do the pre-work. The vision is straightforward: any clinician, anywhere, should be able to run the latest breast cancer detection model — whether it came out of Stanford, Harvard, or Tokyo — without needing a year long IT project to do it. Doctors should always have the most up to date analysis of the patient. AI should do the heavy lifting pre-visit. And patients should have AI that keeps their care top of mind, day in and day out. One 800 pound clinical laboratory said "this is the most impressive tech demo I've ever seen." Another major AMC said "you are so much further along than us." And that's just the stuff in production. Thanks goes to my incredible team, you are all so brilliant, and a joy to work with. Thank you for believing in the mission and for building the absolute best god damn tech-stack in health AI. It's an honor and a privilege to be on this journey together. And to my investors, I couldn't be more grateful for your support, conviction, and friendship. To Annie Case, Derick En'Wezoh, MD, MBA, Byron Ling, and Ben Freeberg, you guys are the best in the business, truly world-class. And to our customers, thank you for trusting us with your business. It's our focus every single day to leverage AI workflows to provide as much value as possible to your patients, projects, and to your bottom line, and I promise we'll never lose sight of that. If you are curious to learn how Health Universe can enable AI workflows inside your organization, please feel free to DM. More in the MobiHealthNews piece below.Ben Freeberg reposted thisAI is already transforming healthcare, but in clinical environments, trust can’t be an afterthought. That’s what makes Health Universe so compelling. In less than a year since launching Navigator, the team has processed 170M+ clinical documents. Congrats to Dan Caron and the team on today's announcement ⬇️ https://lnkd.in/gPJadtqgExclusive: Health Universe raises $6M for AI agents for medical workflowsExclusive: Health Universe raises $6M for AI agents for medical workflows
Ben Freeberg replied to a comment
1mo
Thanks Allison!
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked thisClimate friends, founders, and funders: what would #ClimateWeekNYC be without a new Right to Invest? (Less fun. That's the answer. Less fun.) Everyone in VC has an opinion. We have a show. Last year's Climate Week forged RTI. We came in spotlighting climate VCs - then AI came for the whole ecosystem. 300K views on the 'old show' taught us something, however: we can be the funniest thing in our industry. (Tough competition, obviously. 🙄) So we listened to your feedback, iterated and have crafted something for the community that made it possible. Shoutout to the early believers — Laura, Mary, Tiya, Howard, Nicholas, Scarlett, Brian, Katie, Justin, Preeti, Jeremy, Ed, Alec and many more - who helped us validate our project when we were under a different brand. "Right To Invest" - Season Premiere ➡️ Tickets: https://luma.com/r3zw5s1w September 24th. Doors 5:30. Show 6:30. In partnership with our friends at Human Ventures We can’t navigate the polycrisis without also laughing our a**es off through it. #ClimateWeek #VentureCapital #AI #RightToInvest #Comedy Jonathan Azoff Cheryl Campos Theron McCollough Jessica W. Matt Shoss
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked thisThere is some magic happening in Philly. Jonah rolled out of bed and came downstairs clutching his Tooth Fairy money. I’ll never forget him carrying that $20, with sleepy eyes full of crusties and still dressed in his pajamas. He told us he was excited to give it to JDJ. We had an incredible day showing him where his money was going. From visiting our wheelchair loaner closet, to learning about mobility through testing motorized and manual chairs, to receiving an update on pediatric brain cancer research, it was a wonderful day for our whole family. More than anything, it was an unforgettable teaching moment. #foundation #wheelchairs #pediatrics #cancer #hospital
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked thisOpen invite: we at Luminate are hosting a reception for the cancer care community in the College Green Hotel, Dublin, this Saturday August 29th at 12.30pm to coincide with the College Football game between Texas Christian University and The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill at the Aviva Stadium. To coincide with this game and the visit of delegations from both colleges, Luminate is bringing together the healthcare community from both the US and Ireland for an afternoon of networking, discussion, and even some pre-game analysis. We'll be joined by some excellent speakers, including Nikki Gallagher, Dr M Raheel Khan, Gayle Pierce, and Professor Jennifer Westrup. Registration is free and open to the whole healthcare innovation ecosystem. However, guests must register in advance due to limited capacity. Event link here: https://lnkd.in/eVj-3cffThe Transatlantic Oncology Huddle: Pre-Game ReceptionThe Transatlantic Oncology Huddle: Pre-Game Reception
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked thisWhen I started the Emerging Manager Circle (EMC) back in 2019, I had no intention of starting a “community”. My interest was simple – I needed help. I saw others experiencing the similiar challenges in starting their firms and felt that we could help each other. Over the years, the group has morphed into something far beyond what I had ever imagined could be possible and has taken on a life of its own. With that, it’s only natural that some functions of this group should evolve beyond the purview of Equal to the broader community. Each year, our team reviews thousands of applicants from highly qualified GPs for a few hundred slots at our Summit. While we try to do the best job we can, the process is naturally imperfect. We try to make the process as objective as possible, but at the end of the day, we are only a single POV on the broader venture market – there are others that have not only different, but much more informed opinions than our own. Inevitably, it’s impossible to make everyone happy, but we want to provide the most equitable and fair way to run to provide access to emerging managers that we can. As our team debriefed from last year’s event we realized something – we needed help. This year, we are taking a major step forward in creating the inaugural EMC selection committee – a group of 40 of the industry's most respected GPs and LPs to decide who will be admitted to this year’s event. As you can see from the graphic below, it’s a damn impressive group. This isn’t a cherry-picked list of our LPs or co-investors…it’s a peer nominated list of GPs/LPs who are the best out there. Many of these are current and former speakers who have been part of our community and understand how important this is. They aren’t just selecting for quality, but importance and contributions to the overall emerging manager community. We’re humbled and honored to have this group join and are certainly grateful for all their help! As with all new experiments, I’m sure we’ll fine improvement opportunities for future years, but I’m excited to make EMC something that extends beyond the bounds of Equal. That’s where TRUE community begins – when it’s not an act of self, but that of togetherness. Given the conditions emerging managers are facing in today’s market, I think we could all use togetherness more than ever before. Lastly, if you haven’t applied make sure to get your application in (link in comments) as soon as you can. We’ll be admitting folks in waves over the next few months, so don’t miss out on your chance to join us at the biggest emerging manager event of the year!
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked this🧠 Let’s learn together: WHAT IS A SKILL? Ask an AI to summarize a chart today and the quality of what comes back depends on one thing: who typed the request. Same patient. Same model. Two colleagues. Two different structures, and two different things left out. In most industries that's friction. In clinical documentation it's a quality problem. The fix isn't teaching everyone on your team to write better prompts. It's writing the procedure down once: the sections, the order, the checks that must always run, and having the AI load it every time the task comes up. ⚡ That's a skill. And healthcare already knows this move. You call them order sets, protocols, and checklists. Over the next two weeks we're breaking down what skills are, why repeatability is a safety property and not a convenience, and what we've built for teams who are tired of settling for whatever the model felt like doing that day. 👉 What do you want to learn about skills? Post in comments!
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked thisReceiving an inheritance or experiencing a sudden increase in wealth can bring important financial decisions and many questions. Before making major decisions, it can be helpful to understand the tax, investment, estate planning, and long-term considerations involved. Taking time to evaluate your options can help you make decisions that are appropriate for your individual circumstances and goals. Sudden wealth doesn’t require a sudden financial decision. If you’re navigating an inheritance or other significant change in wealth, you can reach me at Jfreeberg@OnyxBridge.com. #FinancialAdvisor #WealthManagement #OnyxBridgeWealthGroup #InheritedWealth #SuddenWealth
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked thisGood decisions stack on one another. Compound interest. A referral. This Saturday I woke up at 5am to bike from Telluride to Rico, Colorado. I am doing a relay bike race across America next summer so training is on. While I was out there experiencing so much joy, I thought why don’t I do this more? I want to eliminate anything that gets in the way of experiencing this feeling. So while riding up Lizard Head Pass I made a commitment to not drink for 30 days. Then I realized that decision will hopefully lead to another. Drinking isn’t a huge thing in my life, I just don’t want any distractions from the opportunities ahead. We’ve got 275 open jobs to fill at work and I have a bike to ride across America. I couldn’t help but notice the dominos. P.S. if you’re thinking about a new job, I likely have one for you so hit me up.
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Ben Freeberg liked thisBen Freeberg liked thisI wrote my college application essay about the Indiana State Fair and Midwestern ingenuity. Kinda chic to be back here working on sustainability and energy.
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Ben Freeberg reacted on thisBen Freeberg reacted on thisReclaiming the human element in oncology "We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us." - Marshall McLuhan The technology we rely on in modern healthcare was meant to help us, but it has quietly changed how we practice. Too often, it pulls our gaze to a computer screen instead of the patient sitting right across from us. We are at a turning point. By intentionally using artificial intelligence to absorb the administrative friction of our daily work, we can return our focus to the people we are actually here to treat. This is the heart of my book, Rebooting Cancer Care, and my goal is simple: to share practical strategies that help you replace the mundane with the humane in your own practice. I will be exploring this concept in depth during my Opening Presidential Address at the ACCC 43rd National Oncology Conference, October 21-23 at the Omni Boston Hotel at the Seaport. A great location to be discussing innovation. This meeting moves beyond theory into practical application. Hosted by the Association of Cancer Care Centers, it brings together clinicians, administrators, researchers, advanced practice providers, navigators, and patient advocates. It is a distinct opportunity to gather with multidisciplinary oncology professionals from across the country to address pressing clinical, operational, and policy issues. The ACCC represents a dedicated community of over 46,000 professionals working to shape the future of care delivery through education and collaboration. If you are planning to attend, please reach out. I would welcome the chance to connect and discuss how we can drive smarter cancer care together. Disclaimer, I may have aged a bit since the picture below was taken. https://lnkd.in/gAXp5vDa Association of Cancer Care Centers #NOC2026
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Martyn Eeles
Very pleased to have Victorine Lançon Lancon joining us at the HealthVC Summit for our panel, Women’s Health: The Next Frontier for Private Capital. One of the biggest challenges in women’s health is not just building better companies, but making sure the opportunity is communicated in a way that investors understand and can underwrite. Victorine brings a valuable perspective across strategy, storytelling and capital, working both inside a femtech venture studio and through One of the Girls Has Money Now to help close the funding gap in women’s health. That combination of product, narrative and investor thinking should make for a very strong discussion on what it will actually take to attract more private capital into the sector. Looking forward to welcoming Victorine to Zurich on September 3rd. #HealthVCSummit #WomensHealth #Femtech #VentureCapital #HealthTech #HealthcareInvestment #Zurich
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