Oct 24, 2025

Top leaders in health tech said they are betting big on artificial intelligence across their business models at an event hosted by Crain’s and Tech:NYC on how the emerging technology comes to life in the sector.In a panel moderated by Crain’s Assistant Managing Editor Amanda Glodowski, Capsule founder and CEO Eric Kinariwala, Maven founder and CEO Kate Ryder and Dr. Paul A. Testa, Chief Health Information Officer at NYU Langone, discussed how their respective organizations are using AI tools to improve both user-facing and backend functions. The applications have the potential to change both business models and user experiences and are giving businesses a run for their money trying to keep up.Kinariwala of Capsule, a Tribeca-based digital pharmacy, and Ryder of Maven, a Hudson Square-based online women’s and family health provider, both said that their respective companies are applying artificial intelligence in a three-pronged manner, using it to handle repetitive tasks and corporate functions, deploying it to pharmacists and clinicians to assist their work, and creating robotic agents to interact with customers. In Capsule’s case, the company in recent months has begun using large language models to address insurance issues, track inventory and handle prior authorization.“If we had humans doing it, it would be wildly cost-prohibitive,” Kinariwala said.Maven is using AI to help administrators manage user inquiries and provide family planning guidance to customers. But the pace of new technology is so rapid that the companies are having a hard time keeping up. There have been times the company has entered into a contract with an AI vendor only for the technology to be surpassed by another within a matter of months, Ryder said.“You don’t know if you’re implementing the right one,” Ryder said. “It’s very hard for our teams to keep up often, and it’s expensive, but I think ultimately it just means innovation is happening really quickly.”The explosion of early-stage AI startups pitching products to health care companies has also created new security risks that must be managed, said Kinariwala. Vendors have to increasingly be vetted to avoid “fly by night” data retention and sharing standards and privacy policies, he said. For Maven, there are some user data points that are too sensitive to share, said Ryder.For a nonprofit health system like NYU Langone, the increasing adoption of AI represents a shift from decades of data collection to real-world applications, said Testa. The health system is rolling out an ambient listening tool that records patient visits and uses AI to document their chart, to alleviate the time clinicians spend on patient notes. NYU Langone, which isn’t the only New York health system exploring such a tool, plans to implement the program with 1,500 clinicians by the end of the month, he said.Despite the commitment, the health system is still working with two other vendors who may take on similar or complementary roles in the future. “It is such a new space that we’ve not needed to commit to a single platform in many cases,” he said, adding, “There’s no clear winner yet, so let’s just keep up with everybody.”The changing nature of the field and the diverse needs of companies and health systems mean that the promise of AI must be balanced with the moving target of its applications. “Come early and come often…but don’t fall in love with the solution," Testa said.