{"id":5540,"date":"2026-08-31T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/?p=5540"},"modified":"2026-10-05T09:20:02","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T14:20:02","slug":"fuel-podcast-5-cutting-health-care-costs-for-self-funded-employers-with-kirat-kharode-of-healco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/fuel-podcast-5-cutting-health-care-costs-for-self-funded-employers-with-kirat-kharode-of-healco\/","title":{"rendered":"Fuel Podcast 5: Cutting Health Care Costs for Self-Funded Employers with Kirat Kharode of HealCo"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"reproductor de v\u00eddeos de youtube\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/rzNheJAG548\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/share.transistor.fm\/e\/cd8ccda0\" width=\"100%\" height=\"180\" frameborder=\"no\" scrolling=\"no\" seamless=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Resumen<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Employer health care costs have risen 70% over the last decade while wages have grown just 30%. Kirat Kharode, CEO and Founder of HealCo, joins the Startup Junkies Podcast&#8217;s Fuel Accelerator health tech series to break down why self-funded employer health plans are becoming unsustainable, and how HealCo&#8217;s governance layer helps route employees to lower-cost, high-quality care before costs spiral.<\/p>\n<p><strong>En este episodio:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Why self-funded health plans are under more scrutiny than ever<\/li>\n<li>The site-of-entry problem driving up specialty care costs<\/li>\n<li>How HealCo&#8217;s governance and routing model works<\/li>\n<li>What a real cost-savings diagnostic looks like for employers<\/li>\n<li>Why Northwest Arkansas is fertile ground for this kind of infrastructure<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>This episode is part of our Fuel Accelerator series<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u23f1\ufe0f Chapters:<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>00:18 \u2013 Welcome &amp; the Fuel Accelerator health tech cohort<br \/>00:42 \u2013 Meet Kirat Kharode, CEO &amp; Founder of HealCo<br \/>01:00 \u2013 20 years inside hospital C-suites\u00a0<br \/>01:26 \u2013 Inside the self-funded health plan landscape\u00a0<br \/>02:07 \u2013 Why costs are outpacing wages\u00a0<br \/>03:06 \u2013 Site of entry: where health costs really start\u00a0<br \/>04:02 \u2013 Specialty care and the $15K vs. $50K cost divide\u00a0<br \/>05:33 \u2013 HealCo&#8217;s origin story and validation lab\u00a0<br \/>06:36 \u2013 Building the governance layer and how employees benefit\u00a0<br \/>09:06 \u2013 Sponsor: RISE Arkansas\u00a0<br \/>09:33 \u2013 Validating the model &amp; where self-funded care is headed\u00a0<br \/>11:48 \u2013 HealCo&#8217;s 5-year vision, case studies &amp; broker demand\u00a0<br \/>15:49 \u2013 Why Northwest Arkansas, plus advice for CFOs\u00a0<br \/>18:50 \u2013 Connect with Kirat + episode wrap-up<\/p>\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n<p>Connect with Kirat &amp; HealCo<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udd17<a href=\"https:\/\/www.healco.us\/\">https:\/\/www.healco.us\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udd17<a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/kirat-kharode\/\">https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/kirat-kharode\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n<p>\ud83c\udfa7 Sigue el podcast Startup Junkies en YouTube, Spotify y Apple Podcasts. \ud83d\udc4d Si te gust\u00f3 este episodio, dale a &quot;Me gusta&quot;, suscr\u00edbete y comp\u00e1rtelo con un amigo.<\/p>\n<p>El podcast Startup Junkies es posible gracias a RISE, una organizaci\u00f3n que ayuda a las startups tecnol\u00f3gicas y con base tecnol\u00f3gica de Arkansas a crecer con asesoramiento gratuito, orientaci\u00f3n financiera y contactos con expertos. Para m\u00e1s informaci\u00f3n, visita RiseArkansas.org.<\/p>\n<p>\ud83c\udfa7 Sigue el podcast Startup Junkies en <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/playlist?list=PLDJDYh7-pd3x4ha7THQ6Y0bRu1P0RsDLj\">YouTube<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/5DvdrBGZkf26aFNenMmayC\">Spotify<\/a>, y <a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/the-startup-junkies-podcast\/id1014096501\">P\u00f3dcasts de Apple<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Employer health care costs have risen 70% over the last decade while wages have grown just 30%. Kirat Kharode, CEO and Founder of HealCo, joins the Startup Junkies Podcast&#8217;s Fuel Accelerator health tech series to break down why self-funded employer health plans are becoming unsustainable, and how HealCo&#8217;s governance\u2026<\/p>","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":5999,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_meta_description":"Employer health care costs have risen 70% over the last decade while wages have grown just 30%. Kirat Kharode, CEO and Founder of HealCo, joins the\u2026","footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-podcast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5540"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5994,"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5540\/revisions\/5994"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/startupjunkie.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5540"}],"curies":[{"name":"gracias","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}