Why Do So Many HealthTech Startups Stall After Early Traction with Dirk Schaparel

Why do so many healthtech startups gain early traction… and then suddenly stall?

It’s usually not the tech. It’s not the vision. And it’s rarely a lack of effort.

In this episode, I’m joined by Dirk Schapeler, President of Niterra Ventures—the venture arm of Niterra, a $5B Japanese technology company operating globally across automotive, medical, and industrial products.

Dirk also serves as a board member at Arcondis Group, where he supports innovation strategy and global expansion.

At HLTH, I sat down with Dirk to talk about what actually determines whether a healthcare company survives long enough to matter—especially in regulated, capital-intensive spaces like medtech, remote care, and diagnostics.

If you’ve proven demand but growth feels harder than it should, this conversation is for you.

This wasn’t a hype-filled conversation about AI buzzwords.

It was a grounded discussion about patience, leadership evolution, and why healthcare scale is less about speed and more about systems, people, and partnerships.

If you’re building in healthcare and wondering why momentum feels harder than it should… this episode will hit close to home.

🎧 In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why some of the most powerful healthcare innovations come from outside healthcare
• What investors really look for when regulation and reimbursement are unavoidable
• How to think about unmet need vs. “interesting” ideas that won’t scale
• Why leadership evolution, not just vision, determines whether companies break through growth ceilings
• How combining technologies and partners creates defensibility most startups miss
• What founders underestimate about human capital in regulated markets

Episode Timeline:

00:00:00 – Why health tech stalls after early wins

00:04:04 – Why Japanese innovation looks at the U.S. market

00:07:02 – Cold plasma and the future of wound care

00:09:40 – Why wound care hasn’t changed in decades

00:11:27 – Combining therapies, not selling tools

00:13:05 – What investors really look for

00:15:31 – Patience, quality, and long-term thinking

00:18:08 – When founders hit the scaling wall

00:21:09 – Power of global collaboration

00:25:00 – The hard truth about regulated healthcare

00:27:03 – How to connect with Niterra Ventures

🎧 Related Episodes You’ll Love

Why Most HealthTech Solutions Fail: The Hidden Gap Between Innovation and Implementation .css-j9qmi7{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:row;-ms-flex-direction:row;flex-direction:row;font-weight:700;margin-bottom:1rem;margin-top:2.8rem;width:100%;-webkit-box-pack:start;-ms-flex-pack:start;-webkit-justify-content:start;justify-content:start;padding-left:5rem;}@media only screen and (max-width: 599px){.css-j9qmi7{padding-left:0;-webkit-box-pack:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;justify-content:center;}}.css-j9qmi7 svg{fill:#27292D;}.css-j9qmi7 .eagfbvw0{-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;color:#27292D;}