Empactful Capital

Doug Williams is Chairman of the Board at Empactful Advisors and previously served as Chief Operating Officer at HMS, where he held leadership roles including President of Markets and head of Payment Integrity. His background includes experience as Chief Information Officer at Aveta, a $3.5 billion healthcare private equity-backed organization, and senior positions at MedeAnalytics, IBM, and Arthur Andersen, where he spent four years as a healthcare IT partner.

Mark Silverman is a Strategic Advisor at Empactful Capital with 30 years of experience advising, building, running, and investing in consumer and technology companies in emerging markets. He focuses on addressing opportunities and challenges related to aging populations and the 1.2 billion people transitioning beyond career and parenting stages. He works with for-profit and nonprofit organizations developing innovative solutions in this sector.

Founder of Empactful Capital; the page directs prospective co-investors to contact him.

April Kooiman is a serial entrepreneur and former CEO who currently serves as an operating partner and strategic advisor to venture capital and private equity-backed organizations. She is a board member at Vellum Health and provides mentorship to emerging leaders and entrepreneurs.

Dr. Anne-Maree Cantwell is a Venture Partner at Empactful Capital LLC, where she invests in early-stage digital healthcare companies. A physician executive with experience at Kaiser Permanente, she has worked on telemedicine program expansion and holds expertise in healthcare technology adoption, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate finance. She holds an MBA from Wharton and serves on multiple advisory boards.

Hamilton Shawn serves as Chief Operating Officer of Optum Innovation at Optum. He brings 20 years of experience launching and managing technology and services businesses, with expertise in content, analytics, and healthcare sectors. His background includes generating over $200 million in revenue through new ventures and product development, managing budgets including a corporate investment fund and a $250 million revenue business line, and executing venture investments, mergers and acquisitions, and strategic partnerships.

Jim Mayhall is a Venture Partner at Empactful Capital LLC with experience in business development, sales, and operations. He focuses on healthcare IT and services, analytics, and workflow software technologies, and advises companies from early stage through exit strategy.

Michael Sanderson is an Operating Partner at Empactful Capital, a venture capital firm investing in early and growth-stage healthcare companies. He brings over 35 years of healthcare industry experience as both investor and operator, with expertise in SaaS analytics, revenue cycle management, precision medicine, and drug delivery models. Sanderson has co-founded and led multiple healthcare ventures including Medix Infusion, PierianDX, RemitDATA, and ChartONE.

Nate Gagne is a healthcare finance and strategy professional with 25 years of experience in finance, economics, analytics, entrepreneurship, and consulting. He previously served as CFO of a clinically integrated network at Tufts Medicine, where he supported the transition of over 2,000 clinicians to value-based care and oversaw initiatives in population health technology and behavioral health expansion. Currently, Gagne works as an Operating Partner at Empactful Capital, evaluating healthcare technology investments, and as a principal at Empactful Studios, where he leads consulting engagements with health systems and advises healthcare technology company boards.

Nicole Bradberry is founder and chief executive officer of Nuvita Health. She has held advisory and operating partner roles focused on value-based care and population health across healthcare organizations ranging from startups to Fortune 50 companies, with experience in strategy, product development, operations, and technology implementation.

Ping Zhang is founder, president, and CISO at DeepThink Health. He holds multiple U.S. patents and has experience across cloud computing, SaaS, artificial intelligence, and healthcare sectors.

Rob Falkenberg is the founder of RCF Ventures, LLC and an operating partner at Empactful Capital. He spent 35 years in the managed care industry, including 15 years as market CEO of Ohio and California at UnitedHealthcare before retiring. He currently works as a venture capital investor, board director, and consultant to healthcare companies, with a focus on assisting health technology firms with financing, growth, and industry adoption.

Carrie Nixon is Managing Partner of Nixon Law Group, a national law firm specializing in healthcare innovation and digital health legal and regulatory matters. She serves as Special Advisor to Empactful Capital, a venture capital firm focused on health technology companies, and maintains expertise in remote monitoring, virtual care, femtech, and digital therapeutics. Nixon speaks regularly at industry conferences, provides expert analysis to media outlets, and received the 2022 Telehealth Champion Award from the American Telemedicine Association.

Eleni Kytzidis is the founder of a stealth startup focused on holistic care. She previously worked as a HealthTech investor at Empactful Capital, evaluating healthcare companies and emerging technologies, and is currently pursuing a master's degree in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning.

Jason Barnhouse serves as Strategic Advisor at Empactful Capital. He brings experience in leading multi-unit organizations, real estate investment and development, finance, and business startup operations. His background includes product marketing, retail deployment, mergers and acquisitions, and compensation plan design.

Jimmy Leppert is co-founder and managing partner of Empactful Advisors, a strategy execution firm. Previously, he was a managing director at Kotter International leading global client engagements, and worked as a researcher and consultant at MIT's Sloan School of Management. His client work spans Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, and nonprofits, and has contributed to over $2.1 billion in incremental revenue and cost improvements.

Jonathan Evans is a clinician and behavioral health executive with over a decade of psychiatric emergency room experience. He founded Safe Harbor, the first standalone community mental health center in Northwest Pennsylvania, which later became a for-profit subsidiary acquired by UPMC. Evans subsequently served as founding President and CEO of innovaTel Telepsychiatry, a company that partnered with behavioral health organizations to provide psychiatric care across 37 states before its sale.

Justin Wasserman is co-founder and managing partner of Empactful Advisors, a consulting firm focused on organizational transformation and business strategy. His engagements with multinational corporations, healthcare systems, financial institutions, and government agencies have addressed strategic priorities including operational performance, margin improvement, shareholder returns, and organizational culture. His clients' initiatives have delivered over $3.162 billion in validated revenue and cost enhancements.

Kent Boyer is an Operating Partner at Empactful Capital LLC focused on mergers and acquisitions, business development, and capital acquisition. He has worked across biotech, healthcare, insurance, and technology sectors, with experience in identifying and integrating acquisitions to expand capacity and revenue, as well as developing strategies and partnerships to enter new markets. His background includes creating shareholder value through divestitures and sales of business units.

Linda Rosenberg is co-founder of Behavioral Health Strategy, a boutique advisory firm serving early-stage AI technology companies, nonprofits, and state associations. She previously served as President and CEO of the National Council for Mental Wellbeing, where she expanded membership to over 3,300 organizations and grew annual revenue from $2 million to $55 million while advancing initiatives including mental health parity legislation, Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics, and Mental Health First Aid USA, which has trained 4.5 million individuals. Prior to that role, she held the position of Senior Deputy Commissioner for Mental Health in New York State, where she led the development of assisted outpatient treatment programs, mental health courts, and expanded housing and school-based mental health services.

Megan Snyder is Vice President at Empactful Capital, an early-stage investor in health tech companies. She brings experience in corporate development across healthcare and insurance, with expertise in financial analysis, mergers and acquisitions, strategy, and accounting. Snyder holds an MBA and CPA certification.

Michael Tarino is a health insurance and health services executive serving as Special Advisor at Empactful Capital LLC. His career spans health plans, population health management, and digital health innovation across venture-backed, publicly traded, and non-profit organizations, including leadership roles at Bind Benefits (acquired by UnitedHealth Group in 2021), Definity Health, and DSM Personalized Nutrition. He currently advises healthcare organizations and investors on innovation initiatives, serves on the executive committee for the Heartline Study (a Johnson & Johnson and Apple collaboration), and holds board and advisory positions with Health Quality Partners and several early-stage healthcare companies.

Rick Neeson is an Executive Vice President at Independence Blue Cross with over 30 years of healthcare industry experience. Throughout his career, he has held various executive positions overseeing mergers and acquisitions, business development, venture investments, and market expansion at major Blue Cross/Blue Shield plans, including negotiating a Medicaid company merger that became one of the largest U.S. providers and a $7 billion pharmacy contract. He previously served as Vice President of Corporate Development at Peabody International Corp. and Director of Mergers and Acquisitions at Coopers and Lybrand, and currently serves on the advisory boards of HLM Venture Partners and Empactful Capital as well as the board of Progressions, Inc.

Steve Hanson is a Special Advisor at Empactful Capital, LLC, and holds faculty positions at Florida Gulf Coast University and the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center. He has served as CEO and operating partner for multiple healthcare organizations and ventures, including a health communication startup and remote patient monitoring company Prevounce, while advising venture capital and private equity firms. His experience includes optimizing performance across five health systems and four independent hospitals, executing over $500 million in turnarounds, and expanding employed physician networks by approximately 1,000 clinicians.

Tom Dougherty is Senior Vice President of Sales at SmarterDx. With over 25 years of experience in healthcare services, he has held leadership positions at Optum, MedeAnalytics, HMS Holdings, and Siemens Health Solutions, and helped found a hospital revenue cycle management firm that was acquired by The Carlyle Group. Dougherty holds an MBA from the University of Phoenix and a bachelor's degree from Saint Joseph's University, and serves on the Board of Directors of the Independence Mission Schools.

Torrey Barnhouse is co-founder of LeadWell Advisory Partners and serves as a strategic advisor and growth strategist. He has experience in business development, strategic planning, product management, and capital management, with a focus on analytics-driven operational and financial decision-making. Barnhouse was named to the 2018 class of Top 50 SMB CEOs.

William Winkenwerder is Chairman of CitiusTech, Inc and Winkenwerder Strategies, LLC, where he provides strategic advisory and board services to healthcare organizations, private equity firms, and growth-stage companies. A physician by training, he previously served as CEO of Highmark Health and as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, leading the U.S. military health system. He currently holds board positions at UNC Health, Sagility Health, and WPS Health Solutions, and advises major private equity firms including Bain Capital, Carlyle Group, and EQT.