Matter Health Raises $35M, With Plans For Up To 100 New Primary Care Centers
A one-year-old Nashville startup has big expansion plans thanks to a fresh capital infusion.
Matter Health has closed on a $35 million round of funding, led by San Francisco-based Jordan Park Group, Matter Health co-founder and CEO Mason Mercy said in an exclusive interview.
Founded in 2021, Matter Health operates primary care clinics for inside affordable housing developments, focusing on seniors who qualify for both Medicare and Medicaid. The company currently has four clinics, two in Nashville and two in Memphis, with 23 additional centers under contract in Memphis, Nashville, Chattanooga, Knoxville and Atlanta scheduled to open this year, Mercy said.
Matter Health will use the new funding to open 70 to 100 new primary care centers by 2024, with 30 of those set to open by 2023, Mercy said. The company will also build a clinical support center in Nashville, with plans to hire 50 to 70 people by the end of next year.
Many of those new care clinics will be in Atlanta and Detroit, Mason said, because of their concentration of affordable housing complexes.
“We specifically focus on this population because this group lacks access to proper primary care and education around preventive services,” Mercy, who previously worked at LifePoint Health and Nashville-based startup Xsolis, said. “They most often use the emergency room or an urgent care center as their primary care and they often end up back in the hospital with major acute events because they have co-morbidities, as well. It’s a group that has a lot of challenges. Our goal is to bring this total health care solution right to where they live.”
Matter Health’s clinics feature a “living room” waiting area, an exam room and a telehealth conference area that enables residents who may not own a computer or need help navigating the process to speak with a clinician online. Each center is staffed with a nurse practitioner and a care navigator.
Despite being launched in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, Matter Health’s model proved to be especially effective during the crisis, Mercy said, allowing at-risk older adults to access care with limited exposure. The company was co-founded by former Xsolis executive director and current Matter Health President Austin Sohr, former Pfizer U.S. Government Relations Manager Harrison Steen and Canary Ventures president and co-founder of Nashville-based fintech Built Scott Sohr.
“We started Matter because we saw the need in the vulnerable population and we think our approach is pretty unique, in terms of brining health care to them,” Mercy said.
Source: NBJ
