Careers at Collective Health

Mission

To change the way healthcare works by applying technology and design to how people pay for care.

History

It is often said that personal trials can lead to great discoveries. That is exactly the way Collective Health was born. In 2013, CEO and co-founder Ali Diab experienced a horrible, intense pain in the middle of his abdomen. He went to the emergency room and a scan revealed that his intestines had twisted and cut off blood supply. Diab required emergency surgery. The most difficult part of this ordeal was not the discovery or the surgery but the aftermath.

Upon coming out of surgery, Diab was told by his medical insurer that they could not and would not cover most of the medical costs. They claimed that some of his medical bills were for experimental procedures and could not be covered by insurance. They claimed other portions of the medical bill were due to physician error. The battle took a toll on Diab. In the end, he ended up paying for his surgery out of pocket.

After recovery, Diab, still troubled by his ordeal with the insurance company, turned to a friend for advice. He called his friend Rajaie Batniji, a physician and economist, and asked what possibly could be done about this issue. Over the next few months, the two friends went to work to find a way to fix how Americans pay for healthcare. The result was not an app or a website, but an entirely new way of coordinating care and insurance. On October 13, 2013, Collective Health was born with the mission of building a complete solution to replace employer provided health insurance.

Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund soon took notice of the revolutionary potential of this new company. Thiel had previously said that future breakthroughs in technology will come from start-ups that seek to solve complex coordination problems in their given field. Collective Health fit the bill and Founders Fund became its first investor.

The first round of funding in 2014, brought in $6 Million and six investors. A second round in 2015, also led by Founders Fund, raised $38 Million in funding. The company’s most recent round in October 2015 brought in another $81 Million. The company currently has 250 employees and is based in San Mateo, California.

Benefits at Collective Health