POV - Lisa Suennen - After 35 Years in Healthcare, Valuations Don't Equal Value

Lisa Suennen has spent over 35 years as venture capitalist, entrepreneur, operating executive, and strategy consultant across the healthcare spectrum. She founded and serves as Managing Partner of American Heart Association Ventures, a platform of four venture funds focused on cardiovascular and brain health outcomes.

Lisa has held General Partner roles at Psilos Group, Manatt Ventures, and GE Ventures, as well as senior executive positions at Canary Medical (President) and Manatt, Phelps & Phillips (Partner). Previously, she was an executive team member at Merit Behavioral Care from startup through its growth to $800M in revenue, IPO, and acquisition by Magellan Health.

Lisa currently sits on the Board of Mdisrupt, chairs the International Investment Committee of ANDHealth Digital Health Fund, and serves on multiple investment committees and advisory boards. She is a Fellow of the Aspen Institute's Health Innovators Fellowship, has taught at UC Berkeley Haas School of Business since 2009, and was featured in Forbes 2025 List of the 50 Over 50. Lisa writes the Venture Valkyrie blog and is an internationally recognized author and speaker.

As someone who's worked across every healthcare sector and now leads AHA Ventures, what's the most dangerous myth about healthcare innovation that well-meaning investors and entrepreneurs keep perpetuating?

The biggest myth that gets perpetuated over and over, especially during frothy markets, is that valuation is everything. I find the focus on “unicorn status” and achieving massive valuations very troubling. The only price that matters is the one at exit. And yet entrepreneurs and investors focus energy on calling write-ups in valuation successes rather than steps along a path. As anyone who has lived through multiple market corrections knows, what goes up can come down and valuation is only a sign of what you could convince people to pay, not what the business is necessarily worth (it may be worth more or less).  Rather than focus on valuations from venture rounds, both parties should spend more time worrying about the quality and sustainability of the businesses and not the number of commas on their cap tables.

Healthcare is notorious for clinging to outdated practices. What's the one 'untouchable' convention in healthcare funding or innovation that everyone accepts as gospel but is actually holding the industry back?

A big problem is the thinking that most or all good innovation comes from the U.S. This is getting less and less true for lots of reasons, but it has always been the case that there is great technology, innovation and ideation from other places in the world.  Investors rarely think about these and entrepreneurs in the US fail to consider their potential international competition. If we open our eyes more broadly, we can find some great things outside our usual map of the “world.”

Ironically the new convention that has become ridiculously problematic is that AI must be in every little thing. So many entrepreneurs and especially investors are so focused on funding things with AI in them that when that bubble breaks, they will wish there were fewer vowels in the alphabet. It’s not that I don’t think AI is important, I do. I just think that the emphasis on it over real business value is getting a tad absurd.

Having built businesses from scratch and invested in countless others, what's the one early warning sign that a promising healthcare startup is actually headed for failure that most people miss?

An early warning sign that should never be ignored is when revenue stalls for a few months and the CEO makes excuses rather than changes. I have never once seen a “wait and see” strategy work for failure to grow. As Westley says in the Princess Bride, “We are men of action. Lies do not become us.”  Lying to oneself about the failures of adoption and failing to act accordingly is a sure sign of future decline.

Having worked in healthcare venture capital for over 25 years, what’s the most common mistake venture investors make in assessing companies or leaders?

For me there are three:

1. Pretending that growth happens more quickly than it ever can/does and that exit values will exceed typical ones for your favorite companies no matter what.  Yes, these things happen occasionally, but not typically. We need to be not just optimistic as investors, but also pragmatic with regard to cash burn, profitability, strategic effort, all of it. If we assume the best without regard to reality, we usually get something less than good. When we focus on business fundamentals and the probability that things will go a little less rosy than we like to hope at the time of assessing an investment, we do better. 

2. Also, never forget that inertia is your biggest competitor and that economic alignment is the key to success in healthcare. These are also two big diligence items that many overlook when they get overly enamored of science or technical advancements.

3. Lastly, don’t overlook the CEOs who don’t seem just like you and don’t overestimate management teams where everyone looks and thinks the same way – diversity of thinking, skills, perspective and background really matter.