Why Do So Many HealthTech Startups Stall After Early Traction with Dirk Schapeler

Most founders think innovation dies because the tech wasn’t good enough.
That’s rarely the truth.
At HLTH, I sat down with Dirk Schapeler to talk about what actually determines whether a healthcare company survives long enough to matter—especially in regulated, capital-intensive spaces like medtech, remote care, and diagnostics.
This wasn’t a hype-filled conversation about AI buzzwords.
It was a grounded discussion about patience, leadership evolution, and why healthcare scale is less about speed and more about systems, people, and partnerships.
If you’re building in healthcare and wondering why momentum feels harder than it should… this episode will hit close to home.

🎧 In this episode, you’ll learn:
Why some of the most powerful healthcare innovations come from outside healthcare


What investors really look for when regulation and reimbursement are unavoidable


How to think about unmet need vs. “interesting” ideas that won’t scale


Why leadership evolution, not just vision, determines whether companies break through growth ceilings


How combining technologies and partners creates defensibility most startups miss


What founders underestimate about human capital in regulated markets




Episode Timeline:
00:00:00 – Why health tech stalls after early wins
00:04:04 – Why Japanese innovation looks at the U.S. market
00:07:02 – Cold plasma and the future of wound care
00:09:40 – Why wound care hasn’t changed in decades
00:11:27 – Combining therapies, not selling tools
00:13:05 – What investors really look for
00:15:31 – Patience, quality, and long-term thinking
00:18:08 – When founders hit the scaling wall
00:21:09 – Power of global collaboration
00:25:00 – The hard truth about regulated healthcare
00:27:03 – How to connect with Niterra Ventures


🎧 Related Episodes You’ll Love
Why Most HealthTech Solutions Fail: The Hidden Gap Between Innovation and Implementation – This episode digs into the common pitfalls that healthtech founders face (particularly in scaling and market fit).


Is Your Startup Built on Swiss Cheese? with George Pappas – A strong fit because it explores structural weaknesses in startups (teams, roles, funding) that align directly with what we unpacked with MyPhuong.


What Traction Signals Investors Say Yes To – Especially relevant for founders looking for their first backers, this episode zeroes in on what investors are actually looking for.

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