The motto ‘Where healthcare meets innovation’ defined the inaugural Frontiers Health conference, a commitment we’ve upheld throughout the years.
In the spirit of catalyzing meaningful innovations for patients, healthcare professionals, citizens, healthcare systems, and the industry as a whole, we introduced the Start-up Discovery format from the first global edition in 2016. Far from a traditional pitch competition, this format aims to provide exposure to emerging companies offering scalable, scientifically validated solutions to our broad audience, while also gaining insights and feedback from top investors. Over the years, the Discovery has been eagerly anticipated, with many presenting companies successfully entering the market.
Building on this success, our corporate partners, including large pharma companies and life sciences organizations, recognized the power of our platform to unleash and facilitate promising partnerships addressing specific processes or therapeutic issues, following an open innovation approach. Since then, we’ve diligently searched, vetted, and prepared hundreds of startups to engage with key industry players, curating highly customized events during our conferences, whether they be pitch competitions, award ceremonies, hackathons, and networking events. We’ve worked hand-in-hand with our sponsors and partners to identify the most fitting companies and create the most suitable setup to facilitate mutual knowledge, considering logistical, communication, and agenda perspectives.
Even during the pandemic emergency, we continued organizing similar initiatives in a virtual setting, maintaining the same level of efficiency in outcomes. In the following article, we will review all the efforts invested in harnessing innovations through various formats and the diverse array of players we’ve supported.
Let’s review all the initiatives curated across the editions.
From the first edition in Berlin, at Umspannwerk Kreuzberg, Frontiers Health launched the Start-up Discovery, focusing on crucial themes such as AI & Machine learning patient services, consumer health, digital therapies, gamification of health, corporate wellness, telemedicine, digital biomarkers.
In 2027, Frontiers Health gathered over 400 thought leaders and over 100 startups from across the industry to discuss the growing digital health market, reflecting on the divergence of medicine and technology, as well as how digital innovation is shaping the future of healthcare.Several key topics were discussed, including the evolving role of AI, wearables, apps, and devices in improving healthcare, along with the potential of the newly coined ‘digital therapeutics’ field.
During the 2018 edition, in the cinematic scenario of Funkhaus, Frontiers Health fully unleashed its power of pivoting innovation by co-designing, hosting and showcasing open innovation models, corporate programs and other initiatives aiming at scouting promising solutions:
With an ever-evolving health innovation global community, growing in numbers and categories, FH19 set the stage for multiple partnerships with life science organizations to craft innovation-driven sessions.
In the midst of the pandemic, a hybrid format was chosen for the 2020 edition, combining online global streaming with offline events and activities held at Local Hubs in multiple locations such as Italy, Germany, Finland, Malta, Spain, Switzerland and USA. Reasonably key global health players activated all their sources and networks to identify robust solutions to tackle the most compelling challenges, and Frontiers Health stood alongside them in support.
Back in person, with a reduced capacity of guests to comply with local COVID-19 restrictions, and partly virtually, Frontiers Health gathered its global community in Milan at Palazzo Castiglioni for a long-awaited regroup. At FH21 many innovation initiatives found their home.
The event gathered +850 in-person delegates, plus hundreds of digital attendees. The 2022 edition shed light on topics such as digital therapeutics, digital care delivery and telehealth, digital transformation in life sciences, digital public health and more.
FH23, held in Rome at Auditorium della Tecnica, was designed as an extended event, including inspiring side event, the Italian Summit and the inaugural Digital Medicine & DTx Global Policy Summit. Within such a complex and rich program, we continued to sustain initiatives and opportunities to showcase brilliant health companies.