Good day. WestBridge Capital, a U.S.- and India-based firm with a $7 billion evergreen fund, is pursuing, among other sectors, artificial intelligence in healthcare. One of its flagship investments, healthcare-AI company Innovaccer, is now valued at $3.45 billion; WestBridge led the company’s Series A financing in 2016.

Manthan Shah, principal and head of U.S. investments, says rising costs and labor shortages are drawing the healthcare industry to AI systems that can expedite rote administrative work. AI can streamline tasks like appointment scheduling, medical coding and insurance claims, he says. Over time it will assist doctors, and patients will feel its impact. “The best is when it starts touching the end customer,” he said.

Here are excerpts from the conversation, edited for length and clarity.

WSJ Pro: How would you describe the administrative healthcare AI market? Have all the best prospects been spoken for?

Shah: We’ll start seeing some early winners, but healthcare is a massive area of spend. I don’t think it will be spoken for in the next three to five years. Healthcare is [about] 18% of GDP. If one can capture a sliver of that, there is a big company to be built.

WSJ Pro: How will the opportunity for healthcare AI evolve?

Shah: We are still a little far from AI becoming the front and center of care delivery. AI, given the stakes involved, will first take care of the backend, the more mundane repetitive tasks. Then, it will start moving more to the front end of healthcare delivery. That will be the natural evolution in my mind of how AI impacts healthcare.

WSJ Pro: What are the pitfalls that could slow its adoption?

Shah: There could be one or two things potentially. If AI hallucinates and creates a few instances of bad outcomes, that could lead people to be spooked. The second could be the different systems of healthcare which need to come together. Today, the data sits in [electronic-medical records]. If it’s a big health system, they usually have lots of EMRs. If that ecosystem doesn’t come together cohesively, that could lead to a lack of full visibility around a patient.

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And now on to the news...

Pump up the prompts. Warner Music Group has made a deal with artificial intelligence music-generator Suno that will let the startup launch new models based on licensed songs. The agreement settles Warner’s copyright litigation against Suno.

• Suno’s platform allows users to generate songs based on text prompts. Suno will launch new models next year and require users to be paid subscribers to download songs, the companies said.

If Scott Nelson can’t raise more money by the end of the year, the medical-devices executive says he may have to shutter his startup, FastWave Medical. Nelson’s problem is that a Chinese company is his biggest investor and is blocking every fundraising move he tries to make, he alleges. It seems like an elaborate scheme to destroy the business and gain control of its technology, FastWave claimed in a letter to Cfius, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., which reviews investments from overseas entities with a focus on national security.

Robinhood Markets said it is launching a futures and derivatives exchange with market-maker Susquehanna International Group to expand its array of prediction contracts tied to sports, elections and other events. In a related move, the new exchange is acquiring MIAXdx, a business that clears and executes derivatives trades.

People

Network digital twin technology provider Forward Networks appointed Bobby Condon as chief revenue officer. He was previously at Fastly.

Range, a McLean, Va.-based wealth management platform, landed $60 million in Series C funding. Scale Venture Partners led the round, which included participation from Gradient Ventures and others.

Overstory, a startup providing vegetation intelligence to the utility industry in an effort to protect against outages and wildfires, scored a $43 million Series B round led by Blume Equity. The company is headquartered in Boston and Amsterdam.

Clover Security, a Tel Aviv-based startup providing product security teams with AI agents that embed security into design and planning, picked up a $36 million investment led by Notable Capital and Team8.

CoPlane, a back-office automation provider, was seeded with a $14 million investment. Ribbit led the round, which included contributions from Stripe, Optum Ventures and Terrain.

Zetagen Therapeutics, a Syracuse, N.Y.-headquartered biopharmaceutical startup developing intratumoral treatments for metastatic and primary breast cancer, closed a $12.9 million Series B1 round led by JStar Capital Investments.

Mnzil, a Saudi Arabia-based co-living and transportation platform for workers, raised 44 million Saudi riyals (about $11.7 million) in Series A funding. Founders Fund led the investment, which saw participation from COTU Ventures.

Onton, a San Francisco-based search and inspiration engine for online shoppers, collected $7.5 million in seed funding. Footwork led the investment, which included additional support from Liquid 2 Ventures and others.

Mira, a San Francisco-based startup building AI-powered smart glasses, was seeded with a $6.6 million investment led by General Catalyst.

Maritime Fusion, a San Francisco-based fusion energy startup developing reactors for maritime and off-grid applications, closed a $4.5 million seed round led by Trucks Venture Capital.

SPhotonix, a Newark, Del.-based startup focusing on optical fabrication and ultra-long-term data preservation technology, completed a $4.5 million pre-seed round led by Creator Fund and XTX Ventures.

Interface, a San Francisco-based industrial safety platform, fetched $3.5 million in seed funding from investors including defy, Precursor Ventures and Rock Yard Ventures.

Kovant, a Stockholm-based startup building an agentic platform for business operations, snagged €1.5 million in pre-seed funding led by J12 Ventures.

• Meta Is in Talks to Use Google’s Chips in Challenge to Nvidia
   
• Walmart Is Exploring Bringing Ads to Sparky, its New AI Shopping Agent
   
• Four Top Contenders at Apple to Succeed Tim Cook
   
• Why AI Workers Won’t Let Bots Do the Most Basic Tasks
   
• Dell Technologies Raises Outlook as AI Shipments Increase
   
• HP to Cut Up to 10% of Workforce as Part of AI Push
   
• Best Buy Raises Outlook as Consumers Spend on Tech Upgrades
   
• Autodesk CEO Sees Long-Term Growth Due to Steady AI Demand

• Why ‘hold forever’ investors are snapping up venture capital ‘zombies’ (TechCrunch)
   
• Sam Bankman-Fried goes on the offensive (Wired) 

This newsletter was compiled by Brian Gormley, Yuliya Chernova, Matthew Strozier and Zachary Cole.

WSJ Pro Venture Capital is a premium service of The Wall Street Journal. We cover venture capital and the global startup ecosystem. Share your tips, comments and questions: vcnews@wsj.com

The Team: Matthew Strozier, Yuliya Chernova, Brian Gormley and Marc Vartabedian.