2Flo Ventures is a startup studio and venture capital firm dedicated to accelerating equitable innovation in healthcare. We invest in diverse healthcare entrepreneurs and companies built to close gaps in health outcomes for underserved communities.
Not enough VC dollars go to Black-led healthcare companies or to those solving problems that disproportionately affect communities of color — further exacerbating already glaring healthcare disparities. 2Flo Ventures was founded to redirect capital flow and ensure African Americans are fairly represented in venture capital, funded as entrepreneurs and served by our healthcare system.
critical healthcare problems faced by diverse populations and the innovations to help solve them
best in class talent to develop these innovation solutions, start new ventures and scale across the country
with stakeholders in the healthcare ecosystem including, pharma, hospital systems, and payers.
Fully operating companies designed, launched, and grown.
People employed by 2Flo Ventures portfolio companies.
Raised for 2Flo Ventures Portfolio Companies.
4D Healthware is a Black woman-led virtual healthcare service provider on a mission to close gaps in care for underserved communities with comprehensive telehealth technology.
CancerIQ is a Black woman-led, cancer-focused precision health platform that empowers healthcare providers to detect cancer earlier and prevent it altogether across all patient populations.
ResQ Pharma is a life sciences company seeking to reduce disparities in overdose deaths by improving access to easy-to-use antidotes for non-opiate drug overdoses.
Vivacelle Bio is a clinical stage life sciences company repositioning FDA-approved products to identify safer, more effective treatments for hypovolemia due to blood loss and sepsis — a life-threatening condition that disproportionately affects patients of color.
A biotech company focused on finding a cure for the skin depigmentation disease, Vitiligo.
Akan Biosciences is a biotechnology company focused on improving access to next-generation regenerative therapeutics for injuries and inflammatory diseases. Akan aims to reduce disparities in health outcomes by making stem cell-based therapy widely accessible to patients everywhere.
Schedule 1 Therapeutics is a pioneer in FDA-approved, cannabinoid-based pain relief for hard-to-treat musculoskeletal and neurological conditions. Pain is commonly undertreated in patients of color and is shown to exacerbate adverse health outcomes.
2Flo offers a substantial network of advisors, seasoned entrepreneurs, research partners, corporate sponsors and community-based organizations to support efficient product development and effective solutions to improve health equity.
2Flo actively manages our assets to accelerate the pipeline of solutions for unmet medical and societal needs.
2Flo is focused on growing equitable innovation in healthcare — whether that’s delivering industry-leading returns for our investors or providing African-American talent the resources to succeed via our entrepreneur-in-residence program.
2Flo aims to increase African-American talent in health start-ups via investments and entrepreneur-in-residence program.
#2FloEquityNews: There is promising news in the fight against sepsis— a life-threatening complication of an
#2FloEquity News: Two of our leaders, Paul Burton, JD, MBA and Sharon Ray, wrote this incredible and timely article
#2FloEquityNews: Angela L., COO and Executive Director of the 2Flo portfolio company 4DHealthware, recently attended National Association of
Since December 2018, Paul has been the CEO of Akan Biosciences, a biotech start-up developing regenerative medicinal therapeutics. Through Burton Advisory, he also advises early stage biotech as well as some digital healthcare companies such as Temprian Therapeutics, Schedule1, Cancer IQ, Care Advisors and 4D Healthware.
Additionally, Paul is currently an Entrepreneur In Residence at Northwestern University supporting students and faculty with healthcare oriented commercialization projects.
Previously, he was the CEO of ResQ Pharma, Inc. from July 2015 through December 2018. Similarly, he co-founded Vivacelle Bio, Inc. and was employed as its CFO and a member of its Board of Directors (BOD) from 2012 through 2015.
Paul is a Member of MATTER, a Chicago based healthcare incubator and the Bunker Labs, an Incubator started in Chicago for U.S. military veterans.
Paul started his professional career after law and business school as an investment banking associate at Salomon Brothers (now Citigroup Corporate & Investment Bank) in New York. Prior to grad school he served as a United States Regular Army Commissioned Officer (Infantry). While an undergraduate student Paul worked as a lab assistant at UIC’s Medical School Pharmacology Department, earning three co-authorships for research published in peer-reviewed journals.
Sharon is the founder/CEO of S. Thompson & Associates, a consultancy that partners with Senior leadership teams to develop and optimize HR strategies and practices to help achieve their growth goals.
Sharon serves as Head of People and Operations at Cancer IQ, a genetic cancer risk assessment software firm. She has also served as the head of HR at Panopta, which was acquired in December 2020. Additionally, she served as Chief People Officer at Solstice.
Prior to that, Sharon served as Vice President of Human Resources for healthcare company Emmi Solutions, LLC. In that role, she built the human resources function, developing the HR infrastructure to provide strategic direction for the organization. During her 11.5 tenure, Sharon’s contributions resulted in Emmi Solutions’ acquisition by Wolters Kluwer for $170 million in 2016.
Previous roles include serving as Director of Innovation at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago; founder and Chairman of healthfinch; Chief Medical Officer and EVP of Product at MDLIVE; and founder/advisor to multiple other digital health companies over the years.
He currently sits on the board of Oneview Healthcare and is Editor-in-Chief for Telehealth and Medicine. He has served on multiple national boards in the past, including the Innovation Learning Network (ILN), the Association of Medical Directors of Information Systems (AMDIS) and the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) Foundation.
He has been listed as one of HealthLeader’s “Twenty People Who Make Healthcare Better”; Healthspottr’s “Future Health Top 100”, and Modern Healthcare’s “Top 25 Clinical Informaticists”.
He is an Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University. He has been elected to Fellowship in both the American College of Physicians (ACP) and the Healthcare Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS).
John founded Plowshares Asset Management LLC, with the primary focus of the development of multi-family residential real estate in the midwestern/western US. The firm has branched into healthcare via investments in private companies that seek to better the lives of others.
Prior to 1994 John was involved in various management/board positions with investment firms and partnerships ranging from sales/marketing to CFO/Treasurer/HR.
Chairman on the Board – First Congregational Church Evanston 1994-96
Board of Directors – Evanston Community Foundation 2015-2018
Volunteer – Martha’s Vineyard Food Bank 2020 – present
Andrew is an advocate for purpose-driven founders and their companies, working at the intersection of innovation and social impact.
Andrew has a diverse background with experience in the software, startup, venture capital, and social sectors. Previously, he served as the Head of Operations & Technology at GoodLight Capital, a venture capital firm focused on investing in diverse founders leading impactful companies. The past few years, he has been an active startup mentor, advisor, and investor in ecosystems such as the Polsky Center at University of Chicago and 1871. Prior to that, he co-founded Impaktfel, which supports nonprofits and social enterprises to help them innovate and build organizational capacity to maximize their impact.
He started his career in software engineering, spending 20 years in that space, leading engineering teams in the Enterprise SaaS space. Andrew is passionate about applying lessons and his knowledge from the software world, such as Agile thinking and continuous improvement frameworks like Scrum, to help teams and companies reach their potential.
Andrew is active in philanthropy, having served on a nonprofit board and volunteering for organizations, specifically around youth development and economic mobility. He lives in Chicago with his wife and two daughters and loves exploring the city with them. Besides the energy of the city, he loves being outdoors and enjoys nature through activities like camping and hiking.
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, BA in Economics
Ibraheem is an emerging global health leader passionate about tackling health disparities and preventing the spread of disease.
A first-generation Caribbean-American Muslim, he is passionate about providing opportunities for all and building community to solve complex problems.
He is a serial entrepreneur with experience in research commercialization and innovation. In 2017, he founded City Health Tech, an IoT behavior change solution to prevent the spread of disease. He has spent the last few years in venture capital as a Venture Fellow at DeepWork Capital, a Venture Partner at WeFunder, and then as Director of Platform and Community at GoodLight Capital. He started his career at a $300M research consortia building strategic models and growth plans for the assets as well as identifying new investment opportunities and partnerships. He has collaborated with Fortune 100 companies, leading academic institutions, and civic leaders from across the world.
His work has been featured in Forbes, FOX Chicago, WGN, Northwestern Engineering, and many more national outlets. He currently serves on the advisory board for Northwestern’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation and mentor at Impact Ventures. He is a Gates Scholar and member of the Obama Foundations Community Leadership Corp.
He is married with two cats and enjoys composing music on the piano, playing console video games, and getting his community together to play board games.
Northwestern University BSE Industrial Engineering
Minor in Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Design
