Why Healthcare Is Totally Unprepared for AI
US healthcare has more unproductive labor and more unstructured data than any other industry, making it both vulnerable to disruption from generative AI and especially unprepared for it.
That’s the provocative thesis of Eric Larsen, president of TowerBrook. In this episode, he joins host Steve Kraus to explain why generative AI is unlike any other technology we've seen—and why the $4.9 trillion healthcare sector is uniquely exposed.
We cover:
🧠 What makes GenAI a true “general purpose technology”—and how it compares to past innovations like the microprocessor or the internet
🏥 Why healthcare has failed to adopt past tech shifts, and why this time could be different
🔐 The role of the “F-150”—the 150 leaders who effectively control the US healthcare system
🤝 Whether incumbents or insurgents will win the AI race in healthcare
📉 Why GenAI will reduce labor costs and what that means for health systems that spend over half their budgets on people
🌐 How China is sprinting ahead in deploying medical superintelligence
🧬 What a compressed century of biomedical discovery could look like—and why Larsen believes we’re approaching longevity escape velocity
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About our guests:
Eric Jon Larsen serves as President, TowerBrook Advisors, and as a member of the healthcare leadership team of TowerBrook Capital Partners. TowerBrook is a $30 billion AUM New York and London headquartered investment management firm encompassing private equity, structured minority and growth investment opportunities. The firm partners with and enables a constellation of leading healthcare organizations including health systems, payers and other strategics. Underscoring its commitment to responsible business practices, TowerBrook is the first mainstream private equity firm in the world to be awarded B Corp certification.
Eric is a leading national healthcare strategist, author and advisor to CEOs and boards of directors of healthcare companies globally. For 25 years at the Advisory Board Company (the past five years as President, and now as President Emeritus), Eric dedicated himself to identifying and promulgating best practices to improve US and global healthcare. Since 1986 The Advisory Board Company, headquartered in Washington D.C., has served more than 4,500 healthcare organizations internationally developing proprietary research, technology and advisory services.
Following Optum's (UnitedHealth Group) acquisition of The Advisory Board In 2017, Eric’s purview expanded to include co-leading the formation and growth of Optum’s comprehensive health system partnerships as well as developing market strategy at UnitedHealth Group as Executive Vice President, Market Strategy.
Eric is active in healthcare venture capital, serving as Venture Partner to Thrive Capital ($20b AUM technology and healthcare investment firm) and SignalFire ($2b AUM VC focusing on early-stage seed through series B healthcare and technology companies). Eric is honored to support Arianna Huffington as a board member at Thrive Global (www.thriveglobal.com), helping advance Arianna’s pioneering work in the fields of AI, wellness and work. He has served on the boards of several digital health companies including Somatus (value-based kidney care); Contessa Health (hospital at home company, sold to Amedysis in 2021); and other AI health innovators.
Eric is an advocate for the performing arts, serving as Chairman of the Board of The Washington National Opera and as trustee of The Washington Ballet. He is an enthusiastic traveler, having visited 100 countries across all seven continents. He received his bachelor's degree from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in 1995. Eric and his wife Susi have three teenage children, and reside in Washington DC and Miami.
Read more about Eric’s Paper here: “The GenAI Juggernaut: U.S. Healthcare Is Not Prepared – Full Report (127 Pages, PDF)”
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