By Dr Saarthak Bakshi
PIONEER EDGE NEWS SERVICE
Every healthcare startup begins with a dream to solve a real problem, but very few of these dreams survive without the right support behind them. Building something in this industry takes more than passion, it takes trust, patience, and the backing of people who understand both medicine and business. As someone who has spent years building Risaa IVF and interacting with investors, doctors, and founders across the healthcare space, I have learned that funding decisions are rarely about the idea alone. They are about the people, the evidence and the promise of long- term impact.
Where It All Began
I grew up watching medicine up close, because both my parents are doctors, and my mother, Dr Rita Bakshi, has spent more than 35 years treating patients as a gynecologist and fertility expert. That environment taught me long before I thought about business or investors that healthcare is not just a service, it is a responsibility you carry for someone else’s life and hope.
In 2012, my mother and I started Risaa IVF with a simple goal, to give infertile couples a place where they felt safe, understood and genuinely cared for. We started with trust, not a big team or big investment. Slowly, that promise grew into something bigger, and today Risaa IVF has 14 centres across India, Nepal, and Bangladesh. Every centre we opened was earned through consistent quality of care, and that journey taught me exactly how investors think when they evaluate a healthcare business.
What Investors Really Evaluate
Whenever I sit with investors, I notice a few things stay constant, no matter which startup is being discussed:
➔ The founder first – They want to know if you truly understand the problem you are solving, and if you have the patience for an industry that cannot be rushed.
➔ Real clinical evidence – A good pitch is never enough, investors want proof, real outcomes, and real data that shows the treatment actually works, not just claims that sound good in a deck.
➔ Regulatory seriousness – A founder who respects approvals and compliance earns far more confidence than one who treats it as a formality.
➔ A workable business model – Clarity on who actually pays, whether it is the patient, the hospital, the insurer, or the government, and whether that model can scale.
The Emotional Side Investors Often Overlook
Healthcare is deeply emotional. When someone walks into a fertility clinic, they are carrying years of hope, fear, and patience, not just a transaction. At Risaa IVF, we built our patient experience around this, offering counselling, flexible payment options and genuine emotional support alongside treatment. Investors are increasingly recognising that startups which build this kind of trust retain patients longer and grow more sustainably, and having built Risaa IVF across three countries, I have seen how important it is to plan for scalability early, especially given how different healthcare access looks between big cities and smaller towns.
Backing the Next Generation of Founders
Alongside my work in healthcare, I am also actively involved in the startup and investment ecosystem. I am the co-founder of NEOS Angels, an angel investment network through which I have invested in more than 30 startups, supporting early-stage founders and innovative ventures across emerging sectors. Being on both sides, as a founder who once raised funds and now as someone helping others do the same, has given me a clear view of what separates the startups that get funded from the ones that do not, strong evidence, ethical practices, and a genuine patient first mindset. In healthcare, trust is not just good business, it is the entire business.
