Keragon is known as a rapidly-growing, AI-powered and HIPAA-compliant automation platform for healthcare. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Keragon co-founder Conno Christou to learn more about the company.
Conno Christou’s Background
What is Conno Christou’s background? Christou said:
“My background is quite intertwined with my co-founders. We spent two years together in the army, where we formed a strong bond. After that, we all studied at Imperial College London, where we developed our skills and entrepreneurial mindset. Right after college, we started our first company, which got us into the Google for Entrepreneurs program. That’s when we moved to San Francisco to become a part of the city’s startup ecosystem. There, we learned lessons from the best about entrepreneurship, securing funding, hiring & firing, and scaling a business from the ground up. This experience turned out to be invaluable, years later, in building Keragon.”
Formation Of Keragon
How did the idea for the company come together? Christou shared:
“We decided from the beginning to work on a big problem in the healthcare industry because we wanted to invest our time and energy in working on something that makes a positive impact on people’s lives – The idea for Keragon came from extensive market research.”
“We spent almost a year conducting in-depth research – talking to healthcare professionals and learning about their challenges. Initially, we considered building a different product, but we realized it wasn’t the right fit due to its enterprise nature – we knew our strengths are in product development and technology at scale. And after a while, we identified a critical problem that we knew we could solve. We discovered that many healthcare providers were struggling with outdated administrative processes and many different software tools that don’t work well together. Our research uncovered a huge gap in the integration of different healthcare tools and systems. A gap we’re striving to solve with Keragon.”
Favorite Memory
What has been your favorite memory working for the company so far? Christou reflected:
“So far, my favorite memory is the media storm that the official launch of Keragon has created. After working for a year and a half under the radar in stealth mode, going out publicly about our new venture was a critical test. And we were blown away by the level of interest coming from the media, followed by a flow of new prospects and customers along with interest from new investors. Witnessing Keragon making such a good first impression was a blast for everyone on our team.”
Core Products
Automation workflow example using Keragon
What are the company’s core products and features? Christou explained:
“Our core product is Keragon – a HIPAA-compliant automation tool. It connects various healthcare tools and software without the need for coding, streamlining administrative processes and reducing the manual workload for healthcare providers.”
“Here are the key features:
Integration of existing systems into a single workflow: Keragon connects existing tools like EHRs, CRMs, scheduling tools, and patient intake forms in real time. This means a single update in one system is automatically reflected across all connected systems, eliminating the need for repetitive data entry.
— Automation of administrative tasks: We help healthcare providers by automating mundane tasks such as patient scheduling, patient intake, and form management. This reduces the administrative burden and allows clinicians to focus more on patient care.
— Real-time data updates: With Keragon, any action taken in one tool, like booking a patient appointment, is instantly updated in all related systems, ensuring data consistency and accuracy.
— Security and Compliance: All our integrations and data handling processes are HIPAA-compliant, ensuring that protected health information (PHI) is secure and handled correctly. We also provide robust encryption and disaster recovery features to maintain data integrity and security.
— User-friendly interface: Our platform is designed to be easy to use for non-technical users.”
Challenges Faced
What challenges have Christou and the team face in building the company? Christou acknowledged:
“One of the key challenges we faced while building Keragon was the integration with legacy systems. Despite technological advancements, legacy systems and outdated software are still prevalent in the healthcare industry. And these systems often have old APIs, or in some cases no APIs at all, making integrations a real challenge. To solve this problem, we’ve built the workflow engine to be reliable at scale, capable of handling and unifying different endpoints, and to use AI for smart alerts to notify us of any issues. Our team invested significant effort in understanding and working with these legacy systems, enabling us to create deep and reliable integrations with them.”
Evolution Of Keragon’s Technology
How has the company’s technology evolved since launching? Christou noted:
“We’re continuously expanding our integration capabilities to support a wide range of legacy and modern systems, including various EHRs, CRMs, scheduling tools, and form vendors. We’ve also integrated AI and machine learning capabilities into our platform. In addition, we’ve significantly refined our interface to make it more user-friendly. Finally, we have enhanced the platform’s scalability and performance. We’re also about to launch our new AI copilot that will help all users without any technical knowledge to build and debug workflows at scale. We’re very excited about what’s coming around this – more on that soon.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Christou cited:
“Some of Keragon’s most significant milestones:
— Getting our first customers on board and seeing our platform in action, solving real-time problems as we’ve envisioned.
— The platform’s official launch. The launch has garnered considerable attention from the media and healthcare industry, including new customers who didn’t know that there was a HIPAA-compliant automation solution. The launch has given us visibility within the industry and we’ve seen a huge spike in interest.
— Also, beyond the actual capital and support that comes with the funding, it was a good validation to get the backing and the trust of investors with deep knowledge and expertise in the healthcare industry.”
Customer Success Stories
After asking Christou about customer success stories, he highlighted:
“Many of our customers have found Keragon after having their needs unmet by general automation tools. Tools that are not HIPAA-compliant, leaving vulnerabilities when it comes to working with protected patient information. Here’s a testimonial from one of our customers, Mark Callahan, who’s Head of Engineering at BreatheSuite:
‘We used Zapier for many of our integrations, but when it came to working with protected health information we had to find a different solution for HIPAA compliance. Keragon has filled that gap really well! Their team has been great to work with and super helpful in getting our integrations up and running!’”
Funding
When asking Christou about the company’s funding details, he revealed:
“We secured $3 million in a pre-seed funding round co-led by Focal and Afore, followed by 25madison-Lifepoint Health. This substantial investment enables us to enhance our platform’s capabilities, expand our market presence, and drive innovation in the healthcare industry. We already have over 50 customers, and now that we came out of stealth last month, we’re heads down to building the momentum towards becoming the leader in the space.”
Total Addressable Market
What total addressable market (TAM) size is the company pursuing? Christou assessed:
“Keragon is targeting a substantial market within the healthcare sector. The global healthcare IT market is projected to reach $974.5 billion by 2027. And the healthcare automation segment, which includes workflow automation, AI-powered tools, and integration solutions, represents a significant portion of this market. More specifically, the global healthcare automation market size is expected to reach $90.88 billion by 2032.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Christou affirmed:
“There are plenty of automation tools on the market, but what sets us apart is that our platform is HIPAA-compliant, integrated with hundreds of common vendors in the healthcare place, and it can be used by healthcare professionals within a secure and compliant environment. The best part, is that they don’t need to use any code to set up these automations. Right now, we are the only dedicated automation platform that is specifically designed for the healthcare industry.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of the company’s future goals? Christou concluded:
“Our goals are centered around transforming the healthcare industry through automation and AI.
— Leading digital transformation in healthcare. One of our key goals is to drive the digital transformation of the healthcare sector. By making automation accessible and straightforward for healthcare professionals across the US, we aim to digitize and streamline operations.
— Expanding AI capabilities. We plan to enhance our platform’s AI capabilities, integrating advanced machine learning and predictive analytics. This includes developing features that can predict patient needs, optimize resource allocation, and provide actionable insights for healthcare providers.
— Building a sector-defining company. Our vision is to establish Keragon as a sector-defining company in the healthcare industry.”
