Applied AI Company Baba Raises $40 Million Series A to Improve the Medicare Experience
Round led by FirstMark Capital, with CVS Health Ventures and Valtrius joining returning investors General Catalyst, Genius Ventures and Ground Up Ventures
Funding will expand Baba’s clinical care teams, advance its AI research and grow partnerships with health plans
NEW YORK, Oct. 20, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Baba, an applied AI company modernizing the Medicare and Medicaid experience, today announced a $40 million Series A led by FirstMark Capital, with participation from CVS Health Ventures and Valtrius and returning investors General Catalyst, Genius Ventures and Ground Up Ventures. Baba will use the funding to advance its AI research, serve more health plans and accelerate its value-based arrangements.
For nearly 70 million Americans with Medicare, getting healthcare means juggling doctors, hospitals, pharmacies and benefits, and it’s getting harder: the number of specialists the average Medicare patient sees each year rose more than 40% over two decades. Often a family member holds it all together, with more than 63 million Americans serving as family caregivers, up 20 million over the past 10 years.
Baba is a care partner to patients and their families. Every Baba patient has a dedicated care team, including care coordinators and licensed therapists, who keep every part of their care connected, from specialist visits and hospital discharges to behavioral health, in-home support and needs like housing and transportation. Baba has supported more than 10,000 patients and families across the U.S., with more than 100,000 families on the waiting list.
“By dramatically lowering the cost of operating and coordinating care, we have an opportunity to make care delivery economically viable for populations that have historically been too expensive to serve,” said Connor Sweeney, founder and CEO of Baba. “At Baba, we bring together providers, care coordinators, licensed therapists and AI, supporting people across their medical, financial, social and behavioral health needs. Causal, dollar-denominated care navigation has been a holy grail in healthcare for a long time, and it’s finally possible because of AI.”
Alongside its care platform, Baba is building the leading applied research effort on AI for complex care. The company recently released BabaBench, a benchmark that measures how well frontier AI agents handle long-horizon patient advocacy tasks, including paperwork, calls with insurers, billing and the follow-through that can stretch across weeks or months. While most AI benchmarks test whether a model can answer a question correctly, BabaBench tests whether an agent can fully complete the job from start to finish without privacy violations and prohibited actions. BabaBench is available as a preprint on arXiv and has been accepted to an upcoming NeurIPS workshop.
As part of its efforts to advance innovation for Medicare and Medicare Advantage patients, Baba has partnered with national health plans, government agencies, leading academic institutions and nonprofits, including recent partnerships with the American Stroke Foundation and the American Breast Cancer Foundation. In June, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services selected Baba for the ACCESS Model, the CMS Innovation Center’s 10-year test of technology-supported chronic care, across all four of its clinical tracks: early cardio-kidney-metabolic, cardio-kidney-metabolic, musculoskeletal and behavioral health.
Since its emergence from stealth, Baba has expanded its leadership team, bringing on Alicia Tennenbaum, LCSW, formerly of Mount Sinai, as executive director of clinical operations, and designer Alan Li, formerly of Ramp.
“At FirstMark, we’ve spent years backing category-defining digital health companies that use technology to level the playing field for those shut out of care — whether due to stigma, access, cost or geography,” said Rick Heitzmann, co-founder and partner at FirstMark Capital. “Baba is our latest bet on the consumerization of healthcare, this time for the millions of Americans who are rural, older and have more complex needs. They’ve proven that AI can finally bring Medicare patients and families the coordinated, concierge-level care they’ve always deserved.”
“Navigating healthcare is not a challenge that can be solved by general AI agents. However, by training on specific long-horizon activities and keeping humans deeply in the loop, I’m excited for how Baba can help more patients get the care and support they need,” said Carter Prince, partner at CVS Health Ventures.
About Baba
Baba is an applied AI company modernizing the Medicare and Medicaid experience, helping patients and families get the right care at the right time. As a care partner to patients and families, Baba brings together licensed clinicians, care coordinators and AI so people can get, afford and keep track of the care they need. Backed by General Catalyst, FirstMark Capital, CVS Health Ventures, Valtrius, Genius Ventures and Ground Up Ventures, Baba is based in New York. Learn more at www.callbaba.com.
Media Contact:Tori Barnestori@toribarnes.com