This Serial Entrepreneur Raised $350 Million To Build The First Virtual Cancer Clinic

In the ever-evolving landscape of technology and entrepreneurship, few stories are as multifaceted and inspiring as that of Othman Laraki. His journey started from humble beginnings in Casablanca, Morocco, to the bustling epicenter of innovation in Silicon Valley.

This interview dives into Othman’s story, offering a deep exploration of the world of building, scaling, and transforming companies. He reflects on his experiences as both a founder and investor, his pivotal role in the evolution of tech giants, and his vision for the future.

Othman relates his experiences working in healthcare and artificial intelligence and eventually building Color. He is currently active on the investment side and excited about the AI wave and its implications in the cancer space.

Listen to the full podcast episode and review the transcript here.

From Casablanca to Stanford: A Bold Leap Into the Unknown

Othman’s story begins in the vibrant and culturally rich city of Casablanca, Morocco. This place shaped his worldview with its unique blend of Arab, Berber, Jewish, and European influences. Growing up in such a culturally diverse environment instilled in him a global perspective.

However, Othman’s early exposure to technology, courtesy of his father, truly ignited his passion. “My father wasn’t technical, but he was a bit of a nerd who loved new technology,” he recalls, reminiscing about the day his father brought home an Amstrad computer.

That moment sparked Othman’s love for computers, even though, at the time, he had to manually type in code from magazines just to play games.

At 18, Othman made a bold decision that would change his life—he packed his bags and moved to the U.S. to attend Stanford University. Arriving in the Bay Area in 1996, just as the internet wave began to swell, he found himself amidst a technological revolution.

Othman had no firm plan, but his enthusiasm for engineering and fascination with computers and physics placed him at the heart of the tech world, where he rubbed shoulders with some of the biggest names in Silicon Valley.

Early encounters with Jerry Yang of Yahoo and Larry Page and Sergey Brin of Google set the stage for an extraordinary career.

The Genesis of Epitrope: The First Foray Into Entrepreneurship

During his time at Stanford, Othman’s exposure to entrepreneurship grew. He was involved in running an entrepreneurship speaker series, where his professor, Tom Kosnick, urged him to invite industry pioneers like Masayoshi Son from SoftBank.

It was an exhilarating time, but instead of diving into startups immediately, Othman chose to work as a software engineer post-college. However, the entrepreneurial itch was always there, and soon, he co-founded his first company, Epitrope, just as the mobile internet began to emerge.

Othman remembers partnering with some of the smartest people he knew, hacking different ideas. Epitrope was built on the belief that mobile internet would become a significant force, but the timing was too early—this was the year 2000, well before smartphones dominated the world.

Despite this challenge, Epitrope’s partnership with Japan’s Access Systems gave Othman a unique vantage point to explore mobile technologies and the infrastructure for the i-mode in Japan. This happened years before the iPhone debuted in the market.

During this phase, he learned that the right idea at the wrong time is often indistinguishable from a wrong idea altogether. Though the company didn’t reach its full potential, the experience laid the groundwork for future successes.

Google: The “Cambrian Era” of Innovation

After Epitrope, Othman took his talents to MIT and went on to join Google in 2004, when the company was still in its early, explosive growth phase. For someone passionate about building, Joining Google at this time was akin to being in a “candy shop.”

Then, the internet bubble burst, and Othman recalls the massive layoffs and companies shutting down. At the time, people started to think that the internet was over and had been overhyped. But Google started to turn things around again.

It was a moment in history when the scale of ambition was unlike anything Othman had ever seen. Google was pushing technological boundaries with moon-landing-style projects like Android, Chrome, Gmail, and Google Maps. The company seemed to have almost infinite resources.

Reflecting on this period, Othman vividly recalls the intellectual intensity and sheer audacity that characterized the company. At that time, Google hired some of the brightest minds from places like Bell Labs and academia, creating an environment of relentless innovation.

“If it was technically possible, we could do it,” Othman says, highlighting the company’s innovative and future-forward approach. He loved the atmosphere, culture, and people he was surrounded by at Google. They were working on the early machine-learning models with a million parameters.

Projects like these may seem quaint today, but they seemed to defy logic at that time. Technical achievements happened routinely in short intervals, which was incredible to watch.

Mixer Labs and Twitter: Navigating the Geo Space Revolution

After a few years at Google, Othman co-founded Mixer Labs, a company focused on geo-location technologies just as the GPS API was being introduced to mobile phones–iPhones and Androids.

Mixer Labs aimed to capitalize on the emerging trend of location-based services, building the infrastructure to support such applications. As Twitter began its “hyper-local instantaneous community dynamic,” it acquired Mixer Labs to enhance its geo-based services.

At Twitter, Othman’s focus shifted from building geo-location products to fortifying the platform’s infrastructure. He ended up doing more systems work and witnessed Twitter’s massive growth from 15 million users to close to a quarter billion users by the time he left.

Mixer Labs had a robust engineering team, and Othman played a crucial role in stabilizing Twitter’s famously unstable systems and data centers, particularly during the massive user growth.

This period also provided Othman with an entirely different experience—unlike Google’s “nerdy” environment, Twitter was a much more socially driven company.

It was at the intersection of technology and culture, influencing real-world events like the Arab Spring and attracting attention from global figures such as Lady Gaga and world leaders like Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.

Othman recalls his excitement with some anxiety at watching Twitter’s effect and its emergence as one of the tools through which society changed fundamentally. These tools they were building changed the fabric of how information and relationships flew across human societies.

Othman also looks back at his concern that truth or accuracy no longer had a competitive advantage. Information propagation became the survival or natural selection process. Technology was deeply changing the substrate, along which the dynamics of human beliefs were also changing.

It was interesting to note that made-up information actually has a competitive advantage and is not encumbered by reality. In fact, the definition of truth is questioned fundamentally.

Healthcare and Gen AI: The Next Frontier

Othman’s attention next focused on healthcare and the transformative potential of artificial intelligence. “Healthcare is a tough space to become an entrepreneur,” he admits, but precisely this challenge excited him.

Othman and Elad Gil, his co-founder at Mixer Labs, had been working together since their days at Google and were close friends. They were also together at Twitter. Elad had a biology background, having attended MIT and held a PhD in biology.

Elad brought his genome sequence on a hard drive and pitched it to Othram. The duo started exploring the data and realized that the wave of genetic information was accessible and cheap. However, the software that could intersect healthcare and data and analyze it was unavailable.

Othman realized that the software infrastructure was in its nascent stage. He was also interested in the concept personally because his grandmother, a two-time breast cancer survivor, finally succumbed to the disease.

Running the genome sequence test, Othman discovered she carried the Spanish mutant gene VRCA2, BRCA2, which he also carried. Diving into the intersection of genetics and cancer, he could see how the data could be used to help people proactively.

Othman’s deep interest in how Gen AI can revolutionize the cancer space and healthcare as a whole became the driving force behind his current venture, Color Health. Through his 12-year journey, he has learned a lot about the healthcare industry as an entrepreneur.

The Challenges of Healthcare as a Technologist

Talking about his experiences, Othman reveals that despite its immense scope, healthcare is highly challenging to innovate in as an industry–particularly for a technologist. He believes it is not just difficult due to regulation but because of its monopolistic and constrained structure.

Looking at the healthcare market and money flows, Othman opines it’s a highly illiquid sphere. Unlike other industries like SaaS, where better, cheaper products can quickly capture market share, healthcare is constrained by the lack of an open marketplace and direct competition.

Instead, insurance companies run the healthcare market with business models that control the money flow. They focus more on extracting rents from clinical services rather than improving health outcomes.

This creates a challenging environment for product builders who find it hard to access the market and derive value from the innovations they create.

Healthcare and Antitrust Issues

Othman notes that healthcare is where real antitrust problems exist in the U.S. economy. Companies like United Health Group, a Fortune 5 company, succeed not because they are good at healthcare but because they are skilled at extracting financial rents.

He finds it ironic that while antitrust conversations focus on tech giants like Google and Amazon, the healthcare industry—which comprises 20% of the economy—is often overlooked, even though its inefficiencies and costs far exceed those of other sectors.

Color’s Business Model: Vertical Integration

Color, Othman’s company, has gone through several pivots and evolved into a vertically integrated care delivery platform. It operates a 50-state medical group, working with doctors to run healthcare programs.

Color also runs diagnostics infrastructure and lab laboratories and develops software systems to provide in-house testing and processing. The company offers population health programs to major buyers, such as government agencies like the NIH, big employers, and unions.

Color runs the country’s first 50-state virtual cancer clinic, a comprehensive program for cancer management—from early screening to survivorship. Its customers include large employers like Salesforce and unions, such as the teamsters, truck driver unions, and pension funds.

With cancer accounting for 15-20% of healthcare costs and 3% of US GDP, Color’s approach helps large organizations manage healthcare expenses more efficiently while improving outcomes. It targets the problem that people get diagnosed with late-stage cancer, which costs $0.25M each.

Color Health is about the modern age rethinking of how to help distributed populations on a national level. The objective is to take control of cancer and deliver better outcomes.

A Capital Efficient Journey

Color has raised about $350M, but the company’s model is extremely capital-efficient. Many of its programs are cash-flow positive, allowing it to run largely on internally generated funds rather than relying on constant fundraising.

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Othman mentions their involvement in major programs, such as the NIH’s million-person All of Us program and public health testing during COVID-19, as examples of how their business model delivers affordable and equitable services while being cash flow positive.

Talking about his experiences with fundraising, Othman reveals that it’s been challenging, but they have had great backing from investors. Raising funding is tricky since it’s harder to generate great returns, like in AI or other capital-light sectors.

The multiples in healthcare are much lower than in SaaS companies, but it has a much bigger impact on people’s lives, Othman points out.

Addressing the Healthcare Access Problem

Today, accessing care, like getting a colonoscopy or cancer screening, requires navigating numerous steps—finding a doctor, getting referrals, and traveling to labs—all inconvenient, especially for those living far from major cities.

Othman envisions a future where technology streamlines access to healthcare services. Color’s vision is to automate these processes and schedule appointments, allowing people to receive the care they need without unnecessary delays.

For example, through their partnership with OpenAI, they built the “Cancer Copilot,” which helps patients start treatments immediately after diagnosis, potentially improving survival rates by 10-20%.

The Disconnect Between Science and Real-World Care

A major issue in healthcare today, as Othman sees it, is the gap between scientific innovations and the care that people actually receive. For instance, while lung cancer screening for at-risk individuals could save countless lives, 94% of those who should get annual screenings do not.

This isn’t due to cost or lack of awareness but because of the complexity and inconvenience of accessing these services. Othman believes that closing this gap through technology and better market models will impact healthcare more than any individual drug or treatment.

Technology’s Role in Transforming Healthcare

As Othman says, “It’s just an access problem. It’s literally a simplicity and convenience and transactional efficiency problem. So, it’s a market problem, not a scientific or medical problem.” He is excited about the intersection of technology and AI with general digital health.

Othman emphasizes that the real potential of technology, including AI, lies not in revolutionizing science but in disrupting outdated business models. Technology can make previously expensive or inaccessible healthcare services abundant and available.

In the future, expertise that once took weeks to access could become available in seconds. This transformation will be crucial in making healthcare both more efficient and equitable. A good example is prostate cancer.

Prostate cancer affects 1 in 8 men and early detection yields a nearly 100% five-year survival rate.

Entrepreneurial Lessons Learned

Reflecting on his entrepreneurial journey, Othman shares some key lessons. One of the most important is balancing the need to sell a vision with the responsibility not to over-promise.

While entrepreneurs must convince others to believe in a future that doesn’t yet exist, remaining grounded in reality is crucial. Othman also stresses the importance of surrounding oneself with high-quality people and working closely with them.

He also advises entrepreneurs to understand the difference between intensity, determination, and focus and learn to recognize the signals the market provides. Othman admits that he took criticism personally but has learned to listen to feedback more constructively over time.

Pivoting with Purpose

Othman concludes by highlighting the importance of being nimble and willing to pivot as an entrepreneur. Rather than stubbornly sticking to an idea, experienced entrepreneurs learn to adjust their beliefs based on real-world data.

Success often comes from learning quickly and adapting, not from being right the first time. As a seasoned entrepreneur, Othman sees value in constantly iterating and improving based on market feedback, a lesson that has shaped his approach to building businesses.

Conclusion: A Visionary Builder

Othman Laraki’s journey from Casablanca to Silicon Valley depicts the power of bold decisions, perseverance, and relentless innovation. His story spans continents and industries, and his impact is felt across multiple sectors—tech, infrastructure, and healthcare.

Whether working at companies like Google and Twitter or founding his ventures, Othman has consistently demonstrated an ability to build, scale, and innovate.

As he focuses on the transformative possibilities of artificial intelligence and healthcare, the world will watch closely to see what this visionary builder will create next.

Listen to the full podcast episode to know more, including:

• Othman Laraki’s exposure to a multicultural environment shaped his global perspective and influenced his approach to technology and entrepreneurship.
• Epitrope failed despite its innovative vision for mobile internet. He learned that having the right idea at the wrong time can be as detrimental as having the wrong idea altogether.
• His experience at Google during its early days exposed him to “moonshot” projects and an environment of relentless innovation, emphasizing the importance of pushing technical boundaries.
• At Mixer Labs and later at Twitter, Othman played a pivotal role in stabilizing Twitter’s infrastructure during massive growth. He also observed the profound societal impact of technology, mainly how misinformation can gain a competitive advantage in social media.
• Othman’s company, Color Health, is leveraging artificial intelligence to address healthcare inefficiencies. His work aims to streamline access to critical health services, particularly in cancer prevention and management.
• Othman highlights the monopolistic nature of healthcare markets, dominated by insurance companies focused on financial gain rather than improving health outcomes, making it hard for technologists to innovate.
• Othman emphasizes the importance of balancing vision with realism, being open to pivots based on market feedback, and surrounding oneself with talented people. These lessons have shaped his success across multiple ventures.

 

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