All of This Has Happened Before
The author compares four high‑profile digital‑health failures—Olive AI, IBM Watson Health, Carbon Health and Babylon Health—to reveal a repeatable playbook of overpromising and underdelivering. In each case, bold claims were funded before any independent proof, with elite investors and government endorsements standing in for missing data. The companies mis‑branded rudimentary technology as AI, expanded scope to dodge accountability, and only admitted defeat after external investigations forced a reckoning. The piece argues these patterns erode clinician confidence and patient trust in health‑tech innovation.
Strategic Insights: The Last King of Babylon
Babylon Health, founded by Iranian‑born entrepreneur Ali Parsa in 2013, rode a wave of AI‑driven telemedicine hype to a 2021 IPO that valued the company at $4.2 billion. Within two years, mounting regulatory scrutiny, clinician distrust and operational shortfalls forced the...
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice Prompt
A senior product leader revealed that their board is pushing a ten‑fold increase in feature output by leveraging AI‑assisted "vibe coding." The author warns that while AI eliminates the engineering friction that once acted as a quality filter, it also...
Strategic Insight: Carbon Health’s Boom, Bust, and Bankruptcy
Carbon Health surged during the pandemic, scaling from a few clinics to over 125 locations across 13 states by leveraging COVID‑19 testing sites and telehealth, and raising more than $600 million in venture capital, including a $350 million Series D at a $3.3 billion...