Brian Weiss’ Post

We, at Wahed Ventures, are thrilled to announce our latest investment opportunity: Ruh, a multi-award winning healthtech startup dedicated to making mental health support widely accessible to millions of Muslims worldwide. 🌍 Globally, many Muslims report facing religious discrimination, leading to mental health challenges that often go unaddressed. According to a study, Muslims are more likely to experience mental health issues than any other minority group. Yet, this segment remains highly underserved with lack of culturally responsive therapy options. 🕌 Ruh addresses this critical need by offering religiously aligned online mental health therapy and support to individuals and families, delivered by an ethnically diverse team of Muslim therapists. 📈 The Western Muslim addressable market is estimated at $1.6 billion, whereas the global mental health market is valued at $375 billion with expectations to hit $532 billion in 2030. With the rising awareness of mental health issues and the growing demand for culturally competent care, Ruh is at the forefront of providing tailored, culturally and religiously sensitive mental health solutions to the Muslim community. Join us for an exclusive webinar tomorrow, Tuesday, June 11, to learn more about Ruh’s mission and the journey so far, meet the visionary founders Omar Khan and Humeyra N. Celebi-Karaalioglu, and explore how you can participate in this round. Register for the webinar: https://lnkd.in/ePBnaN2j Disclaimer: This post is intended for our UK Audience. Capital at Risk. Don’t invest unless you’re prepared to lose all the money you invest. This is a high-risk investment and you are unlikely to be protected if something goes wrong. Take 2 mins to learn more: https://lnkd.in/epuhbCKf

The rich are chasing the fountain of youth, and they're investing their fortunes to find it. Maximilian Winter was sick, and his doctors couldn't figure out why. Then 23, the Santa Barbara-based engineering student struggled with brain fog and always felt tired, even if he slept 10 hours a night for a week. But despite this fatigue, Winter doggedly pursued a diagnosis and a cure. He was diagnosed with Lyme disease after seeing five doctors. It took two years for him to make a full recovery. After an initial course of antibiotics, he changed his diet and sleep routine, took up meditation, and resorted to hyperbaric oxygen chambers, UV blood filtering, and infrared saunas. Winter isn't quite sure what was the silver bullet or if there even was one. He was able to afford these treatments thanks to a family fortune derived from German automobile part supplier Fritz Winter. Through his family office, he started investing in healthcare and life sciences in 2018, initially looking to help develop better treatments for Lyme disease but was drawn to deeptech startups that seek to 3D print organs and use AI for drug discovery. He spun off these investments into a fund that has deployed more than $20 million since 2021. "They say entrepreneurs are people that end up solving their own problems that they experience themselves but also that a lot of people experience," Winter, now 34, told Business Insider. "I think that was true for me." Winter is part of a growing group of family office principals, including heirs like himself and first-generation entrepreneurs, who are making direct investments in pursuit of longer and healthier lives. They are in good company; longevity startups drew global investment of more than $5.2 billion in 2022, according to a venture capital firm, Longevity Tech Fund, which used PitchBook data. Billionaires like Peter Thiel have made headlines for backing efforts to reverse aging at the cellular level. But for many investors like Winter, the goal isn't to cheat death. Driven by their own health struggles or deaths of loved ones, they want to extend not only lifespan but more importantly our health span, or how many years you can spend free of chronic diseases or age-related ailments. Winter thinks a health span of 90 to 120 years is "fairly reasonable" for him given the pace of medical advances. (There is only one documented case of someone living past 120). However, he is skeptical of the idea that scientific discoveries can outpace aging to enable people to live indefinitely. "There's been a lot of hype around longevity. We haven't seen a lot of it materialize," he said. "I think the most credible approaches that we've seen are still in choosing specific conditions and things that really affect people in their old age and could ei https://lnkd.in/encC6Vnn

We always enjoy hearing about the origin stories behind startups! This thought-provoking Sifted article highlights founders who launched companies based on their personal experiences and challenges 🚀 What are your thoughts on this approach? 🤔 https://lnkd.in/dcj4pURN

We always enjoy hearing about the origin stories behind startups! This thought-provoking Sifted article highlights founders who launched companies based on their personal experiences and challenges 🚀 What are your thoughts on this approach? 🤔 https://lnkd.in/dcj4pURN

"We have a lot of clinicians on our team who have been at the front lines, and can recognize the detailed clinical needs for both providers and patients." GV's Ben Robbins wraps up MobiHealthNews' investment series — shedding light on GV's digital health investments, the role of AI in healthcare, and his background in psychiatry. Read more ➡️ https://bit.ly/3z4EFQw

🌟"Thanks to top-notch scientists, progressive regulation and a high degree of trust from investors and philanthropists, the Czech Republic is emerging as a regional leader in Europe in the field of psychedelic-assisted therapy (PAT)."🌟 🔍 Interested in how philantropy and investments drive the development and success of novel mental health treatments in the Czech Republic and around the globe? Look no further: https://lnkd.in/eMyvTWxs 💬 Check out these insights from last weeks conference's panel "Philanthropy and Investments Behind Novel Mental Health Treatments": Miton Group partner Václav Štrupl: “The trends in mental health of recent years, especially after Covid, are alarming. Psychedelics may therefore provide a good tool to help in this area.” He adds: “We would like to build a comprehensive ecosystem around psychedelics, which would include not only research and support for clinical trials but would also work towards destigmatisation and communication with regulators.” “For me, supporting psychedelics and its related research is a long-term project, but it makes a lot of sense. I currently see legislation as the biggest obstacle,” said investor and philanthropist Ondřej Fryc. “We can be the innovation hub of Europe, but we need a clear vision and legislation,” said Václav Dejčmar, adding: “I believe that psychedelics can be important for treatment, but I also believe that they can be crucial for the future of all humanity, because we are living longer thanks to science and research, and if we live to be a hundred years old, we are at risk of dementia. So we need to prolong the life of the body as well as the life of the soul.” Hayim Raclaw, director of business development at Negev Capital said: “Psychedelics have been a big topic over the last five years, particularly in the US, and that’s very interesting to me from an investor’s perspective, and I see opportunity there.” He adds: “Europe is quite behind in research compared to the US, Canada, the UK or Australia. However, I do see positive trends and activity in Europe, particularly in the Netherlands and in the Czech Republic.” Thanks Startup Kitchen for this great overview!

We always enjoy hearing about the origin stories behind startups! This thought-provoking Sifted article highlights founders who launched companies based on their personal experiences and challenges 🚀 What are your thoughts on this approach? 🤔 https://lnkd.in/dcj4pURN

We always enjoy hearing about the origin stories behind startups! This thought-provoking Sifted article highlights founders who launched companies based on their personal experiences and challenges 🚀 What are your thoughts on this approach? 🤔 https://lnkd.in/dcj4pURN

🚀Monday Inspiration with Paul Aretin, one of the co-founders of coobi🚀 Fundraising can be daunting, but Paul's experience offers valuable lessons and insights: 💡 Honest investor feedback is crucial for refining business models. 💡 Persistence and the right mindset are key to convincing investors. 💡 Strategic investors with healthcare expertise and networks are highly beneficial. In our 6th cohort, coobi has secured a significant portion of their pre-seed round and is preparing for a pivotal clinical study. They emphasize starting fundraising early, finding the right investors, and balancing public and private funding. At coobi, their mission is to harness technology to make addiction treatment more accessible and effective. They are developing an innovative, machine learning-based algorithm that uses digital biomarkers from smartphones and wearables to assess individual relapse risks and deliver objective insights into addictive behaviors. Their solution serves as digital aftercare for individuals recovering from addiction, providing personalized, data-driven support to enhance rehabilitation outcomes. By leveraging the power of technology, coobi aims to transform the landscape of addiction treatment, making help more readily available and improving the efficiency of care. Discover coobi’s strategies, challenges, and the immense opportunities in the mental health startup space! Read more here: 👉 https://rb.gy/njbzee Tag fellow founders who could benefit from insights on fundraising journeys! #MondayInspiration #VisionHealthPioneers #StartupJourney #Fundraising #MentalHealth #Innovation #HealthcareStartups #AddictionTreatment #DigitalHealth #TechForGood

How does the SUD program address substance use disorder differently? Hanna Adeyema, director of MIT Bootcamps, says, "Traditionally, innovation programs in the substance use disorder space focus on entrepreneurship and business courses for researchers and inventors. These courses focus on knowledge, rather than skills and practical application, and omit an important piece of building a business — it takes an entire ecosystem to build a successful startup, particularly in the health care space." Read more about how the SUD Ventures program is contributing to innovation in substance use disorder in MIT News at https://bit.ly/3XzlJ4C