The Public Health Company Launches to Protect Businesses and Communities from Infectious Disease
World-class team raises $8 million in seed funding from Venrock, Verily
GOLETA, Calif., April 29, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The Public Health Company (PHC), the first company that offers a platform to protect businesses and communities from infectious disease, officially launched today. As part of that, PHC announced that it closed a $8 million seed funding round including investments from Venrock, Verily, and Sweat Equity Ventures.
"The COVID-19 pandemic reinforced how disruptive uncontained disease outbreaks can be to business operations, the normal functioning of society, and the health and well-being of millions," said Dr. Charity Dean, CEO and co-founder of PHC. "But today most organizations still take a reactive instead of a proactive approach to the risk management of communicable disease, and most companies just don't know where to start when it comes to balancing keeping their people safe with being able to operate. We founded PHC to help organizations manage that risk."
PHC has developed the first Public Health as a Service (PHaaS) platform for businesses, health care providers, and public health systems that systematically combines real-time public health data, containment best practices, and genomic epidemiology to prevent, detect, and contain costly disease outbreaks. PHC combines this platform with unparalleled public health expertise to give organizations easy-to-understand recommendations to strike the critical balance between the continuity of operations and the safety of employees and clients.
"The COVID pandemic was a wake-up call to organizations of all sizes that they are running a major operational — and even legal — risk by not protecting themselves from infectious disease outbreaks," said Bryan Roberts, a partner at Venrock and member of the board of PHC. "We believe that biosecurity will become as essential and valuable as cybersecurity to enterprises in the years to come, and the team at PHC has the technology and expertise to dominate this sector."
Novel pathogens, such as the COVID-19 coronavirus, are just one of the existing and emerging threats that PHC will help institutions handle. Healthcare-acquired infections also cause approximately 90,000 deaths per year in the U.S., and cost as much as $45 billion annually. There are more than 2.8 million antimicrobial-resistant infections annually in the U.S., costing upwards of $34 billion. Foodborne infections such as E. coli can sicken thousands, close processing plants, and lead to costly recalls. The highly contagious norovirus is the scourge of the cruise industry.
PHC is a growing, world-class team of public health professionals, tech innovators, data scientists, and infectious disease experts including:
- Charity Dean, MD, MPH, Co-Founder and CEO, former Assistant Director of California Department of Public Health
- Brian Levine, MBA, Co-Founder and CFO, former partner at Goldman Sachs
- Terese Tatum, MSN, MBA, COO, former VP of Strategic Operations at One Medical
- David Dynerman, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer, former Senior Data Scientist at Chan Zuckerberg Biohub
- Joshua Batson, PhD, Chief Data Scientist, former Senior Research Scientist at Chan Zuckerberg Biohub
In addition to Venrock's Roberts, PHC's advisors and board members include: Dr. Joe DeRisi, co-president of Chan Zuckerberg BioHub; Dr. Carter Mecher, senior medical advisor at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs; Dr. Mark Pandori, Director of the Nevada State Public Health Laboratory; Brad Katsuyama, CEO and co-founder of IEX Group; and Todd Park, co-founder and executive chairman of Devoted Health.
About The Public Health Company
The Public Health Company (PHC) is on a mission to protect businesses and communities from infectious disease. The COVID-19 pandemic reinforced how disruptive disease outbreaks can be to business operations, the normal functioning of society, and the health and well-being of millions. PHC has developed the first Public Health As A Service (PHaaS) platform that systematically combines real-time data, containment best practices, genomic epidemiology, and unparalleled public health expertise to give organizations easy-to-understand recommendations to strike the critical balance between the continuity of operations and the safety of employees and clients. Founded by a world-class team of public health professionals, tech innovators, data scientists, and infectious disease experts, PHC is backed by, among others, Venrock, Verily, and Sweat Equity Ventures. For more information, visit us at: phc.health.
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SOURCE Crosscut Strategies LLC
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