Exclusive: Rocket Doctor Blasts Off With $2.7M Seed To Expand Telehealth Marketplace

Rocket Doctor wants to turn your home into a makeshift doctor’s office and raised a round of $2.7 million in seed funding to continue developing its direct-to-patient diagnostic kits.

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The company, which is remote-first but has bases in Toronto and San Francisco, launched in March 2020 and began sending out its kits last June. It now has more than 130 doctors using its platform to care for nearly 40,000 patients, according to co-founder and CEO Dr. William Cherniak.

Cherniak got the idea for Rocket Doctor during his time as an emergency room doctor in the U.S. and Canada, as well as through his not-for-profit experience at Bridge To Health, bringing health care to remote regions of East Africa. He joined with co-founders Adam Teitelman, Harry Cherniak and Dr. Justin Losier to form Rocket Doctor.

“We are building something that recreates the in-person experience of a doctor’s office while making health care more efficient and cost-effective,” William Cherniak told Crunchbase News. “Doctors can talk to patients, but sometimes I have to put hands on a patient to get vital signs, and the devices we are sending provide better care virtually and prevent them from going to the ER. We have a proprietary tech stack and are now sending kits containing advanced devices and tools in pediatrics, family practice, as well as ear, nose and throat in downtown Toronto.”

The kits include items such as oxygen saturation probes, digital thermometers and bluetooth stethoscopes. Rocket Doctor has also built out a system to develop the audio files from the stethoscope readings so that they are ready by the time the physician logs in, he added.

The round was led by f7 Ventures and Dr. Irv Edwards, founder and president of Emergent Medical Associates. The new funding gives Rocket Doctor a total of $3.8 million in funding after receiving $1.1 million of pre-seed funding last year.

Cherniak intends to use the new funding to expand across the United States and Canada, add to the engineering team, and develop the company’s go-to-market strategy. Rocket Doctor has on-boarded four employees in the last few weeks, and he expects that to grow this year.

The company will also build out more of its technology and at-home device offerings as it prepares to raise Series A funding in September, he added.

f7 Ventures general partners Kelly Graziadei and Joanna Lee Shevelenko said they like Rocket Doctor’s approach of “doctors building for doctors.”

“We talked to physicians about using the platform, and they told us that it fits in their insights and that really stood out,” Graziadei said. “We were wowed by Bill and his expertise in the device space. He has built that trust and is the perfect person to do this.”

Lee Shevelenko added that Rocket Doctor fits with f7’s mission of seeking out companies that are working on problems affecting humans, which involves future of work, mental and physical health, and connecting communities.

“We are in a world where chronic conditions can now be managed at home, through telehealth and devices, using an interactive platform with your doctor to manage the care,” Lee Shevelenko said.

Illustration: Dom Guzman