Robin Healthcare Raises $15 Million to Build Digital Assistant for Doctors, Launches Partnerships with Leading Health Systems, and Adds Siri Co-Founder Tom Gruber as Advisor
BERKELEY, Calif., Sept. 18, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Robin Healthcare, a health technology company that provides a digital assistant service elegantly leveraging human and artificial intelligence (AI) to free physicians from paperwork, announced today the close of $11.5 million in Series A funding led by Norwest Venture Partners. The latest round brings Robin's total funding to $15 million. In addition, Robin announced the launch of partnerships with several leading academic and private medical practices across the United States, and named Tom Gruber, co-founder and former Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Siri, as a formal advisor.
"With Robin, doctors are free to focus on their patients rather than computer screens and get a note that's actually useful," said Noah Auerhahn, Co-Founder and CEO of Robin. "Using natural language processing, machine learning, and human-centered design, Robin is re-conceptualizing clinical documentation and making health information more effective. This new infusion of capital will help us forge a path toward eliminating administrative overhead for doctors and improving patient care. Furthermore, Robin's ongoing relationships with premier institutions accelerates product development cycles, allowing us to deliver more value to clinicians and health systems."
Casper de Clercq, Partner at Norwest Venture Partners, said, "Robin has the clinical, technical industry, and technical heft needed to streamline physician documentation and alleviate burnout. We see a growth opportunity and are delighted to invest in Robin."
Robin's platform addresses the incredible burden doctors face daily to complete clinical documentation and administrative work. The average physician now spends two hours on paperwork and screen time for every hour of patient care1. These tasks distract them from patients in the office and follow them home at night, and as a result more than 50% of doctors are experiencing burnout2. Moreover, the resulting documentation is not ideal for patient care. It is frequently riddled with errors and warped to serve insurance and regulatory requirements rather than its original purpose — to help doctors take care of patients.
Robin places its HIPAA-compliant Robin Assistant™ device unobtrusively in the exam room and writes high-quality, fully billable clinical notes based on audio and optional video of a physician's natural interaction with patients. Using ambient Conversational Speech Recognition, Robin works without wake words, specialized vocabulary, dictation, or other workflow changes. The platform blends cutting-edge AI technology with quality assurance by trained healthcare staff to produce doctors' notes, integrating directly with electronic medical records and securing all patient data with end-to-end, military-grade encryption. Physicians who use Robin in their clinics simply review and sign their notes; they save precious time, see more patients, and enjoy higher satisfaction in their work.
Robin customers and partners include major academic and private physician practices including Duke University Medical Center’s Private Diagnostic Clinic. Visit robin.co/clinics for the most up-to-date list.
Additionally, Tom Gruber joins Robin as a formal advisor. Gruber was co-founder, CTO, and head of design for the team that created Siri, the intelligent assistant. At Apple for more than eight years, Tom led the Advanced Development Group that designed and prototyped new capabilities for Siri and related products that bring intelligence to the interface.
"We're thrilled to have Tom join our Advisory Board. His wealth of experience and proven track record in AI and smart assistants will be invaluable to Robin as we continue to expand our industry-leading digital assistant to doctors and patients nationwide," added Auerhahn.
About Robin Healthcare
Based in Berkeley, CA, and led by a team of repeat founders (e.g., Extrabux, Essia Health), Robin Healthcare combines the deep clinical knowledge and technical expertise required to capture medicine's complexity, ensure the highest quality for patient care, and offer an affordable clinical documentation solution for every doctor. Robin's leadership team has clinical training at the University of California (UC), San Francisco (UCSF) and UC, Los Angeles (UCLA); informatics and machine learning experience; and, natural language processing training at UC, Berkeley. Robin has assembled a world-class team of clinical, artificial intelligence, and medical scribe industry experts to make the practice of medicine more human-centered. Read more at www.robin.co.
1 Annals of Internal Medicine (2016)
2 Becker's Hospital Review (2018)
SOURCE Robin Healthcare, Inc.
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