Define Ventures Welcomes Tamar Rudnick as Head of Partnerships

We are thrilled to announce that Tamar Rudnick has joined Define Ventures as Head of Partnerships. Tamar brings a wealth of experience from her roles across the healthcare industry, most recently serving as SVP of Growth at Apree where she led sales, marketing, and customer functions.  Her extensive background includes consulting for Fortune 500 healthcare companies and over a decade in operating roles across the employer, payer, and provider spaces.

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In her role as Head of Partnerships, Tamar will leverage her deep industry knowledge and operational expertise to support our partner companies in their growth and commercialization efforts. She will play a crucial role in helping our founders build strong go-to-market strategies, scale their operations, and forge valuable partnerships within the healthcare ecosystem.

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At Define, we believe progress requires strong partnerships between innovators and incumbents. It will take all stakeholders involved to build the next generation of healthcare. Tamar's addition to our team reinforces our commitment to providing this crucial support. Her experience and insights will be invaluable as we continue to pull the full weight of our network and expertise to play offense and drive results for both our partner companies and strategic partners at large healthcare organizations.

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We sat down with Tamar to unpack what attracted her to Define Ventures and why she’s excited to join the team.

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Why Define?

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Joining Define feels like a tremendous  opportunity to take on a role that's both strategic and leverages my strength as an operator. I'm working with people I truly respect, in a position where I can collaborate with founders and help commercialize their solutions,  while also investing in building strategic partnerships with key healthcare buyers.

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Define's emphasis on commercialization aligns perfectly with my skillset and experience. I've seen countless examples of solutions built from the inside that lacked product-market fit or failed to achieve successful commercialization. I  understand how critical it is to get it right. This alignment between my experience and Define's approach is a key reason why I'm here."

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What are you taking from your operating experience?

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Throughout my career, I've been in operating roles ranging from early-stage startups to public companies and private equity-backed businesses. I've witnessed IPOs, mergers, and take-privates, while serving in leadership positions across various functional areas.  I’ve also learned my share of valuable lessons along the way - from the outsized impact that the right hire can make on a sales team, to the impact that a brand change can have on a marketing strategy, to how to evolve a go-to-market motion from employer to payer. 

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As I support Define’s partner companies in their own growth efforts, I hope to bring the learnings from these experiences to bear.  If I can act as a ‘secret weapon’ to coach talented founders and navigate early teams through potential pitfalls, help them avoid mistakes that I’ve made, and increase speed to market, that’s an incredibly rewarding way to apply my own experiences.  . 

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Why healthcare?

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My journey in healthcare has been an evolution. I've always been drawn to complex industry dynamics and big, unanswered problems , and healthcare certainly fits that description. The intellectual challenge of our ‘broken healthcare system’ fascinated me early on.

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Over the years, mission has become increasingly important to me.  Once you work  in healthcare, you understand what it means to build solutions that are genuinely improving people’s lives. That makes it hard to go back to building the next SaaS based automation tool, where you might get to discover  product market fit, but it doesn’t have any impact beyond that.   

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And more recently, my commitment to working in healthcare became personal when I experienced what it meant to be a caretaker for a family member going through a difficult healthcare episode. That experience opened my eyes to the criticality of accessing high quality care, making healthcare affordable, and making it easier for patients and families to navigate the complex healthcare system. 

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For all those reasons, I hope to continue to work in healthcare for decades to come. 

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What does our value "Defining Healthcare" mean to you?

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A mentor once told me, 'healthcare is too important to stay the same,' and that sentiment has stuck with me. I view healthcare as one of the most consequential subjects we can devote our lives and careers to. It's deeply personal and has the power to change lives for individuals and families. At the same time, it's one of the key macro forces impacting our country as a whole.

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I'm thrilled to be joining the Define team alongside a group of healthcare professionals who are dedicated to changing and improving the industry. 'Defining Healthcare' to me means being at the forefront of this change – identifying the most pressing issues, supporting innovative solutions, and working tirelessly to create a healthcare system that better serves everyone.

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What does our value "Defining Partnership" mean to you?

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In my experience, successful partnerships in healthcare are the result of payers, providers, employers, and consumers joining forces to create market-level change. Partnership means finding ways to work together to create value for all stakeholders, manifesting in improved clinical outcomes, increased accessibility, better care experiences, and reduced medical costs.

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The most enduring partnerships are those built on deep personal relationships, shared experiences, and trust. In my role at Define, I have the privilege of fostering this model of partnership. I work hand-in-hand with extraordinary founders and teams to drive scale and growth, while also partnering with strategic players across the healthcare ecosystem to facilitate innovation. The goal is to create long-lasting impact through the strength of these collaborations.

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'Defining Partnership' to me means going beyond traditional investment relationships. It's about creating a network of support, expertise, and shared vision that can truly transform healthcare. It's about being a true partner in every sense of the word – offering not just capital, but also guidance, connections, and a deep understanding of the healthcare landscape.

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What does our value "Defining Leadership" mean to you?

Leadership is hard to define but easy to recognize. In the context of healthcare innovation, leadership can take many forms. It can be found in early-stage founders with unrelenting vision and determination, who push forward despite numerous obstacles. It can be seen in investors with real operating experience who support entrepreneurs during critical moments in their company's growth, offering not just funding but also invaluable guidance and mentorship.

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Leadership is also evident in changemakers who want to innovate from within scaled healthcare organizations, navigating complex systems to drive meaningful improvements. Many years ago, a CEO I worked with told me that his goal was for each and every employee at our organization to have the best experience of their professional career there. Since then, I have aspired to work alongside and become someone who maintains this high standard of leadership.

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To me, 'Defining Leadership' in the context of Define Ventures means embodying these qualities – having the vision to see where healthcare needs to go, the expertise to guide others on that journey, and the commitment to fostering an environment where everyone can do their best work. It's about leading by example, inspiring others, and always keeping the ultimate goal of improving healthcare at the forefront of everything we do.

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We are excited to have Tamar join our team and look forward to the valuable contributions she will make in shaping the future of healthcare innovation. Please join us in welcoming Tamar Rudnick to Define Ventures!

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