Weekly Health Tech Reads 3/1/26

Hims reported on Monday, with its stock falling another 7% on the week. Hims side-stepped much of the GLP-1-centric drama over the past few weeks, instead going out of its way to repeatedly note how little of its business is compounded GLP-1s today and how unconcerned it seems with the GLP-1 mess it is in. International growth is becoming a central piece of the Hims story, as they shared plans to rapidly expand in the top 10 international markets on the heels of recent acquisitions, before focusing on profitability in those markets later. If you trust the management team's narrative, there is still a compelling one here, as they expect to grow the business to $6.5 billion in annual revenue and $1.3 billion in Adj EBITDA by 2030, up from $2.3 billion and $318 million today, respectively. As I shared in Slack this week, if you took away all identifying details and told me a company generating $2.3 billion of revenue, growing 59% YoY, with an Adjusted EBITDA margin of 14%, is only trading at an enterprise value around $3.8 billion, I’d tell you that seems like a great investment. Yet when you tell me that the company is Hims, and their management team neglected to mention on the earnings call that they’re under SEC investigation, after all the recent shenanigans, I very much see why investors are skeptical here.

Evolent traded up 25% for the week after reporting strong growth, specifically in oncology. The oncology business is expected to be 65% of Evolent’s revenue in 2026, up from only 36% in 2025. Evolent is seeing a ton of new business, with its 2026 cohort generating $900 million of revenue, up from its previous estimate of $550 million. The call featured some interesting nuggets about how Evolent’s approach is proving particularly effective in oncology, where a single tumor type can have up to 200 different care pathways today. The ACA business is a notable drag on Evolent’s 2026 results, as its two largest exchange customers decreased their membership by 60% and 40%. If you’re interested in VBC, especially specialty VBC, I’d encourage you to listen in here.

agilon stock is up 31% after it charted a path to Adj EBITDA breakeven in 2026, a vast improvement from a loss of almost $300 million in 2025. It has been on a significant recontracting effort in 2025, noting in part that it shed ~50k MA lives that didn’t align with its approach of prioritizing profitability. agilon’s three largest customers are Aetna, Humana, and UHC, so it’s interesting to consider who will take back that bad risk in 2026.

Alignment Health reported on Thursday, and despite exceeding the high end of guidance on all metrics, its stock fell ~6% this week. Alignment continues to execute well despite the challenging broader MA market dynamics, driven by its underlying approach to care management as a health plan. Given the consistent performance, the question for Alignment is really how quickly it can grow and whether its model will continue to perform. 2027 is setting up to be a fascinating year for Alignment as the market expects it to demonstrate its ability to grow both quickly and profitably, particularly outside California. I had the chance to chat with Alignment CEO John Kao on Friday afternoon (see below for the interview), and he articulated his view that the lack of IPAs outside of California should actually make performance easier in those markets, which appears to be supported by Alignment’s early results in those markets. Will be worth keeping an eye on that 2027 growth conversation here.

Clover’s stock didn’t move much this week as it achieved Adjusted EBITDA profitability for 2025 and expects to achieve positive net income in 2026. As Clover moves past its hype-filled SPAC-y era, it increasingly looks like a smaller version of the Alignment narrative on the opposite coast. It is finding success as an MA plan in New Jersey, built on its history as a provider-sponsored plan in that market. But it has struggled to build on that momentum outside of the New Jersey market. While it grew 53% to 153k members in 2026, New Jersey accounts for ~127k of Clover’s membership. Georgia is the only other state where it has any notable membership, which grew from ~10k to ~22k members. Clover’s tech platform, Counterpart Health, remains part of the narrative, but when analysts ask questions like “will it contribute to 2026 guidance?” and the answer is “no,” it’s hard to get too excited about the opportunity there, as we sit here almost two years after the Counterpart model was publicly announced.

Privia Health continued its streak of solid performance and saw its stock increase ~10% this week. Privia’s earnings call was relatively uneventful, with questions largely focusing on how Privia continues to grow from here. There were some interesting conversations in Q&A around how Privia is positioned to use AI, the growth opportunity from the Evolent Care Partners acquisition, and in other markets, and Privia’s approach to shared risk in MA.

GoodRx stock dropped 18% on lower-than-expected revenue guidance for 2026.

Teladoc stock jumped 15% on a solid quarter despite broader headwinds particualrly in the BetterHelp business.

Apple | Spotify | YouTube

Reengineering ACOs for competition and better outcomes | Liz Fowler and Purva Rawal. A good conversation about some of Fowler and Rawal’s recent suggestions for supporting ACOs

Designing and delivering home-based care for dual-eligible populations | Oren Shatken + Romanos Fessas. Martin chatted with Jukebox Health leadership about home-based interventions for LTSS populations

The Grand Roundup: February 23rd, 2026.

Home health provider Enhabit is going private, as PE firm Kinderhook Industries is acquiring it for ~$1.1 billion. Enhabit generated $1.06 billion in revenue in 2025 and $107 million in EBITDA. Enhabit has faced meaningful headwinds since spinning out of Encompass in 2021. It has struggled to adjust to reimbursement changes and the growth of Medicare Advantage. The analyst commentary on the deal seems to highlight the dynamics well here — it's a nice win-win for Enhabit shareholders and Kinderhook. Enhabit shareholders get a short-term win while Kinderhook also seems to have long-term upside here in a market poised to rebound over the coming years.

The DOJ is suing OhioHealth over its contracting approach in Columbus, where the DOJ argues that insurers have no ability to offer alternative plan designs because of OhioHealth’s contracting approach — specifically its use of anti-tiering / steering provisions and all-or-nothing contracts.

Comments on the 2027 Advance Notice were submitted this week, and many organizations posted their responses on social media. While I’m still going through a number of them, the Better Medicare Alliance response seemed worth perusing for its tone — supportive of some of the changes around program integrity, but notes concern over the proposed effective growth rate and the negative impact that will have on beneficiaries if finalized.

CMS announced a new set of actions it is taking to crack down on fraud, including deferring $259.5 million in quarterly federal payments to Minnesota while the state addresses some of the program integrity and fraud issues that have gained national attention in recent months.

Allina Health’s Minneapolis Heart Institute and Innovaccer announced a partnership to launch a virtual heart failure program for patients using Innovaccer's Story Health platform. It’s interesting to think about a partnership like this in the context of CMMI’s new ACCESS model, as this strikes me as the exact type of partnership you want to see announced if you’re CMMI.

As Oregon continues to grapple with a challenging cost equation in Medicaid, Providence Medical Group and CareOregon have agreed to halt referrals to Providence’s specialty clinic services as of February 15th. CareOregon, the largest Medicaid plan in the Portland metro area, expressed confidence that members will still be able to receive care.

Honest Health, a VBC enablement platform, raised $140 million. NewSpring Healthcare led the round, with participation from big healthcare names including Rubicon Founders, Oak HC/FT, and Welsh Carson. Honest has been relatively quiet for a few years after starting in 2021 via a partnership with an IPA in Buffalo, NY, and expanding into Michigan in 2022 via a partnership with BCBS Michigan. It appears from the press release that Honest’s focus is shifting away from a PCP-centric approach to more of a health system enablement play, which will be worth keeping an eye on.

Salma Health, a center-of-excellence model for brain health, raised $80 million. Mubadala Capital and ARCH Venture Partners led the round. It appears that Salma has ties to Magnus Medical, the developer of the SAINT Neuromodulation System, a new TMS therapy for depression. This seems like a key component of the Salma Health clinic offering. Salma currently has four clinics in California and plans to expand across the US.

Third Way, an administrative platform for provider practices, raised $15 million. Health Velocity Capital led the round. Third Way notes it is supporting practices that collectively see 5 million patients per year, and is driving reduced front office admin costs of up to 40%, increased patient visits by 11%, and reduced phone wait times by half. Astrana Health and California-based MSO MedPoint Management had previously invested $7.5 million in Third Way.

Handl Health, a platform helping benefits consultants identify high-performing health plans, raised $14.2 million. Arthur Ventures led the round. Handl reports a 22% reduction in consumer costs for shoppable procedures, along with $113 million in total savings across $1 billion in healthcare spend over the past two years.

Coral Care, an in-home pediatric therapy model, raised $13 million. Haymaker Ventures led the round. Coral Care now has a clinical network of over 400 OTs, PTs, and SLPs.

BrainCheck, a digital health tool for cognitive health assessments, raised $13 million. Next Coast Ventures led the round, along with participation from UPMC Enterprises and S3 Ventures.

Baba, an advocacy model for Medicare, raised $6.5 million. General Catalyst led the round. Baba sounds similar in concept to Solace, another startup that recently announced a much larger round. Baba’s website notes that a telehealth doc conducts an initial visit to establish medical necessity before handing the patient off to an advocate.