Mindstrong

Mindstrong (also Mindstrong Health) was a digital mental health company that combined smartphone-based measurement of cognitive function and mood with a virtual care service for people living with serious mental illness. It was founded by Paul Dagum, a physician and computer scientist who served as founding CEO; Tom Insel, the former director of the National Institute of Mental Health (2002 to 2015), who joined as president and co-founder in May 2017; and Rick Klausner, the former director of the National Cancer Institute. SEC filings give 2016 as its year of incorporation. The company was based in Palo Alto and later Mountain View, California, and was led in its later years by CEO Daniel Graf.

Mindstrong announced a $14 million Series A in June 2017, backed by Optum Ventures, ARCH Venture Partners and Foresite Capital. In June 2018 it raised a $15 million Series B that added Bezos Expeditions and Decheng Capital, for $29 million raised in total. On January 3, 2019 it expanded the Series B with $31 million led by General Catalyst, with managing director Hemant Taneja joining the board alongside Jefferson Health CEO Stephen Klasko. Its backers at that point also included Berggruen Holdings and the One Mind Brain Health Impact Fund. On May 21, 2020 Mindstrong announced a $100 million Series C with participation from General Catalyst, ARCH Venture Partners, Foresite Capital, 8VC, Optum Ventures and What If Ventures. SEC Form D filings from 2017 and 2018 match the early rounds.

The company built a model in which its own full-time therapists, psychiatrists and care coordinators served members through an app, paid for through value-based contracts with private and public insurers, and it partnered with Takeda on digital biomarkers in schizophrenia and treatment-resistant depression. Mindstrong did not reach a sustainable scale. Its website announced that effective March 10, 2023 it would no longer provide clinical services to members, cancelled new appointments and moved medical records to a third-party custodian. No acquisition price or acquirer was disclosed on the company's own pages.

For investors, Mindstrong illustrates the risk in pairing a science-led digital biomarker thesis with a capital-intensive care delivery business. Roughly $160 million of disclosed venture funding, led at different stages by life science firms (ARCH, Foresite) and later by General Catalyst, went into the company over about three years, and the clinical operation closed less than three years after the Series C.