Chai Discovery raises $130M Read in browser

Tuesday, 16 December 2025

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Calming nerves with a hot wearable Hey, it’s Shelby. I’m back from maternity leave, during which I surprised myself by embracing health tech more than ever before.  I’m admittedly a technology skeptic. I’ve always preferred in-person doctor’s visits to telehealth. An Apple Watch to track my workouts was as deep into the wearables game as I’d gotten. But when my newborn caught a cold and I worried about her ability to breathe while congested, I turned to a hand-me-down Owlet sock I never thought I’d use. For the uninitiated, the Owlet Dream Sock is a $300 wearable device worn while sleeping that monitors your baby’s oxygen and pulse rate and sounds an alarm if the measures look abnormal. The company’s pitch is that it gives parents peace of mind and can help them respond quickly if something goes wrong. I hadn’t reported on Owlet before, but my impression from what I'd read over the years was that I should steer clear. Parents often buy these socks (and competing wearables) in hopes of preventing SIDS. But they’re not cleared by the FDA for that purpose, and there’s no evidence they reduce that risk. Instead, plenty of experts have warned that false alarms from such tools can lead to more anxiety and unnecessary medical visits. Doctor friends of mine told me the Owlet would just cause panic over nothing. And the accuracy of the sock has been called into question. And yet, I’m still using it months later. All logic goes out the window when you’re an anxious new parent looking for some semblance of a safety net to help your kid. It’s no wonder there’s a growing market for baby health tech. Have I flipped from cynic to Owlet believer? I can’t say the sock has prevented a bad outcome. My alarm has never gone off to warn me of a problem (though it beeps constantly because of connectivity issues).  But what it has done is relieved my anxiety by making me feel like there’s something keeping watch over my kid’s health while I sleep. I just hope it isn’t a false sense of security. - Shelby

Here’s what’s new With GLP-1 microdoses, Noom targets lower-BMI group outside FDA obesity drug labels The tele­health com­pa­ny Noom plans to tar­get peo­ple with a body mass in­dex well be­low the re­quire­ments for FDA-ap­proved obe­si­ty shots, us­ing a mi­cro­dose GLP-1 of­fer­ing. Chai Discovery becomes newest AI unicorn, raising $130M Series B at $1.3B valuation Chai Dis­cov­ery has closed a $130 mil­lion Se­ries B at a $1.3 bil­lion val­u­a­tion, con­tin­u­ing a fu­ri­ous fundrais­ing pace since be­ing found­ed by a quar­tet of am­bi­tious young braini­acs in 2024.

One Number 31.5 The percentage of non-federal hospitals in the US reporting using generative AI in 2024, with 24.7% saying they planned to use the technology in the next year,  according to a 2024 American Hospital Association survey published in JAMA Network Open. That means that more than half of US hospitals anticipated implementing generative AI by the end of 2025.

This week in health Тech OpenEvidence, the AI physician search tool startup, is looking to raise $250 million at a $12 billion valuation, The Information reports. OpenEvidence in October raised $200 million, valuing the company at $6 billion. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued Epic, alleging the company has used anticompetitive practices to monopolize electronic health records. Epic is also facing an antitrust lawsuit from digital health company Particle Health. Drug distributor Cencora is buying TPG’s stake in cancer care network OneOncology. The deal values OneOncology at $7.4 billion. Cencora had previously invested in OneOncology. General Medicine is now using AI to sort through a patient’s health record it pulls together from prior visits. Users can then book new visits based on the results, or review a summary of the care they received. (General Medicine’s TJ Parker told me last month this was in the works.)

John Carroll Editor & Founder Arsalan Arif Publisher & Founder Igor Yavych Architect & Founder Valentin Manov Creative Director Ryan McRae Chief Revenue Officer Amanda Florez Chief of Staff Drew Armstrong Executive Editor Liam Chua Chief Technical Officer Jaimy Lee Deputy Editor Lydia R. Pflanzer Deputy Editor Zachary Brennan Senior Editor Max Gelman Senior Editor Julie O'Meara Executive Director, Brand Partnerships Melissa Nazzaro Executive Director, Brand Partnerships