FERRY HEALTH LAUNCHES OUT OF STEALTH WITH $9M IN FUNDING FOR ITS AI-POWERED HEALTHCARE PERSONAL ASSISTANT

Backed By Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Index Ventures, Ferry Automates Healthcare Tasks for Patients, Starting with Finding and Scheduling Care

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 16, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Ferry Health launched out of stealth today with an AI personal assistant that handles healthcare tasks for patients, starting with one of healthcare's universal frustrations: finding a medical provider and getting an appointment. The company has raised $9M in seed funding from Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Index Ventures, Avid Ventures, Layout Ventures, SV Angel, Box Group, and Asymmetric Capital, as well as angels like Jay Desai and the founders of Grow Therapy, Hex, and Chapter.

"When we were dealing with my dad's care after a hospitalization, we saw firsthand how much of the burden falls on patients and their families in between visits to the doctor's office," said Mehul Mehta, CEO and co-founder of Ferry. "Finding specialists, understanding costs, dealing with insurance all required countless phone calls back and forth. It all adds up to a serious hurdle for people trying to access healthcare, and we saw an opportunity to rebuild the patient's experience with agentic AI."

That experience inspired Mehta to launch Ferry in early 2024, alongside his brother Keyur Mehta, and longtime friend Andrew Buie. "We talked to hundreds of patients, and decided to first tackle the most common frustration we heard – finding and scheduling care," Mehta added.

For most patients, booking care means hours on the phone. Insurance directories are out of date, hold times stretch on, and many calls are dead ends with providers who have retired or are no longer accepting new patients. Ferry's AI agents make those calls for patients instead. Ferry identifies in-network providers, calls to validate location details, subspecialty fit and availability, and ultimately books an appointment for the patient. Patients simply message Ferry and get scheduled with the provider of their choosing, all without ever picking up the phone.

"It felt like I had a team of 10 taking care of us," said Jeremy Zhang, who uses Ferry to help manage his mother's medical care. "My mom had orthopedic symptoms she might otherwise have ignored. When getting an appointment takes almost no effort, it's much easier to address a health issue instead of putting it off."

Through partnerships with health systems, insurers and care navigation platforms, Ferry is helping patients find and schedule care across all specialties and in all 50 states. From finding a doctor to following through on a referral, Ferry handles all of the logistics. Today, more than one million patients have access to Ferry through these partnerships. The company expects that number to grow at least fivefold by year's end.

For early access customers, patients are already using Ferry for more than finding appointments, including coordinating imaging and home health. The company plans to expand the Ferry agent to manage even more of the patient's journey in the coming months.

"We have never had more information on our health. Across our phones, inboxes, and health apps – AI insights are everywhere. What was still missing was the action layer: a reliable agent that gets you from insights to real-world, insurance-covered care," said Vineeta Agarwala, MD, PhD, General Partner at venture capital firm a16z, an early Ferry investor. "As a practicing physician, I know our healthcare system well and have helped many patients navigate it. When I tried using Ferry to coordinate care, it felt like magic."

About Ferry Health
Ferry Health is an agentic AI platform that takes action on patients' behalf, acting as their personal assistant for tasks like finding and scheduling care. Its proprietary software finds the right healthcare providers, makes calls to confirm availability and coverage, and books appointments for patients. Through partnerships with health systems, insurers, digital health companies and care navigation platforms, Ferry removes the friction that too often stands between people and the care they need. Currently available to more than one million patients across all 50 states – a number expected to grow to more than five million by the end of the year – Ferry helps patients access care faster, all in just a few messages back and forth. The company is backed by $9M in funding from investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Index Ventures, Avid Ventures, Layout Ventures, SV Angel, Box Group, and Asymmetric Capital, as well as angels like Jay Desai, co-founder of Bamboo Health, and the founders of Grow Therapy, Hex, and Chapter.

Ferry is on a mission to make navigating healthcare as easy and pain-free as possible. For more information, visit https://ferry.health 

SOURCE Ferry Health