Amazon, Berkshire, JPMorgan Healthcare Venture Finds A CEO

Well-regarded surgeon and author Atul Gawande has been named CEO of the new healthcare company formed by Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase.

Earlier this year, the three companies announced they are working on ways to address healthcare for their U.S. employees, focusing on reducing costs and improving customer satisfaction. Their joint venture’s initial focus will be on using technology to provide U.S. employees and their families with easier, high-quality transparent healthcare at a reasonable cost.

“The ballooning costs of healthcare act as a hungry tapeworm on the American economy,” said Berkshire Hathaway chairman and CEO Warren Buffett. “Our group does not come to this problem with answers, but we also do not accept it as inevitable. Rather, we share the belief that putting our collective resources behind the country’s best talent can, in time, check the rise in health costs while concurrently enhancing patient satisfaction and outcomes.”

The new company will be based in Boston and will operate as an independent entity free from profit-making incentives and constraints.

Its new CEO is a globally-renowned surgeon, writer and public health innovator. Gawande practices general and endocrine surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and is Professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Harvard Medical School. He is also founding executive director of the health systems innovation center, Ariadne Labs.

In addition, Gawande has written four New York Times bestsellers — “Complications,” “Better,” “The Checklist Manifesto,” and “Being Mortal” — and has received numerous awards for his contributions to science and healthcare.

“I’m thrilled to be named CEO of this healthcare initiative,” said Gawande, “I have devoted my public health career to building scalable solutions for better healthcare delivery that are saving lives, reducing suffering, and eliminating wasteful spending both in the US and across the world. Now I have the backing of these remarkable organizations to pursue this mission with even greater impact for more than a million people, and in doing so incubate better models of care for all. This work will take time but must be done. The system is broken, and better is possible.”