Designing an Enterprise Accelerator to Catalyze Health Tech Innovation.
Role
Executive Sponsor
Services
Concept Design & Capital Plan
Operating Model
Stakeholder Alignment
Execution
Marketing & Communications
Mentorship
When
2019 - 2023
UnitedHealthcare
The UnitedHealthcare Accelerator was created to bridge the gap between early-stage health tech innovation and enterprise-scale delivery within one of the nation’s largest healthcare organizations. Rather than treating innovation as a series of isolated pilots, the Accelerator was designed as a repeatable, immersive program that aligns startups within UnitedHealthcare’s strategic priorities and operational expertise.
By combining mentorship, curriculum, strategic alignment, and access to domain expertise, the program aimed to help emerging companies evolve their business models, connect with key stakeholders, and accelerate their path to meaningful scale in healthcare.
Problem + Opportunity
Health care innovation is often siloed: startups struggle to navigate enterprise complexity, while large organizations struggle to integrate novel solutions at scale without meaningful validation. UnitedHealthcare recognized that to harness external innovation effectively, it needed a structured environment where startups and enterprise teams could co-learn and co-design solutions that address real system challenges.
The opportunity was to build a platform — not just a pilot — for collaborative acceleration, where startups could tap into UnitedHealthcare’s strategic priorities, network of experts, and operational insight, while the enterprise could learn from new business models and emerging technology approaches to advance its mission of making the health system work better for everyone.
Approach
1.
Defining the Model
I led a team in the development of the Accelerator’s core design and operating model. This included defining program goals, structure, participant selection criteria, and success metrics — balancing rigor with flexibility so the experience could be valuable both to founders and enterprise stakeholders.
We anchored the Accelerator around a four-month cohort experience that blended structured curriculum with personalized mentorship, real-world problem framing, and strategic access to UnitedHealthcare and Optum expertise.
2.
Catalyzing Strategic Alignment
A key design decision was to align the Accelerator not just with broad innovation rhetoric, but with enterprise strategic priorities. This ensured cohort companies worked on challenges that mattered to UnitedHealthcare — in areas like care optimization, analytics, digital health workflows, clinical enablement, and member experience — while retaining startup agility.
This alignment process involved cross-functional collaboration across product, strategy, clinical, and business teams to ensure that the Accelerator’s themes and problem spaces reflected real enterprise impact areas.
3.
Designing the Participant Experience
We designed a collaborative program that combined:
Mentorship from a curated network of internal and external experts across strategy, technology, analytics, clinical, and business domains
Curriculum and workshops focused on business model refinement, go-to-market strategy, and enterprise integration
Community and peer learning opportunities to foster long-term relationships and cross-cohort support
Showcases and investor engagement to support fundraising and visibility
This structure was intentionally founder-friendly, with program elements built to accelerate companies while grounding them in enterprise realities.
4.
Cross-Functional Collaboration & Execution
Operationalizing the Accelerator required coordinating internal stakeholders across UnitedHealthcare, Optum, and external partners. I led a cross-functional team to build governance, define operating rhythms, and integrate mentorship and curriculum design with strategic input from enterprise leaders.
Execution also included refining the mentor ecosystem — bringing in subject matter experts, executives, and alumni to provide depth and continuity beyond the cohort timeline.
Outcomes
Launched a repeatable, annual Accelerator program that brings together ~10 world-class health tech startups per cohort (3% acceptance rate)
Helped empower ~50 companies to refine their business models, expand networks, and accelerate progress to scale
Designed a program model that balances innovation rigor with enterprise relevance, creating ongoing collaboration channels between startups and UnitedHealthcare teams
Built a mentor network of 100+ domain experts, connecting startup founders with strategic decision-makers and enterprise insights
Reflection
Creating the UnitedHealthcare Accelerator required both strategic design and operational pragmatism — the ability to articulate a compelling vision for enterprise-startup collaboration while building the structures, governance, and partnerships to make it real. The work demonstrated that when done right, accelerators can serve not just as engines of startup growth, but as learning platforms for enterprise innovation, breaking down siloes and surfacing new models that benefit both founders and the health ecosystem.
What This Work Demonstrates
Experience designing enterprise-grade innovation platforms in complex systems
Ability to translate strategic needs into operational programs
Cross-functional collaboration across clinical, product, strategy, and business teams
Leading initiatives that bridge external innovation with internal priorities
Designing repeatable systems for learning, mentoring, and scaling emerging solutions