The Middle East’s largest medical center is readying for its expansion into Boston with a startup accelerator focused on digital and AI-powered health care, set to launch in March 2026.
First announced in May, Israel’s Sheba Medical Center will open its first U.S.-based ARC Innovation location, a “soft landing pad” for international startups seeking to transform the delivery of health care through artificial intelligence and digital solutions.
The broader goals of the Boston ARC site, which is currently accepting applications through Nov. 1, are in sync with Massachusetts’ own quest to become both a national and global leader in AI innovation. Last December, Gov. Maura Healey created the Massachusetts AI Hub, a central entity for the state’s coordinated endeavor.
When the state’s partnership with Sheba Medical Center went public in May, Healey lauded the news as “a big deal.” Simultaneously, Sheba Medical Center leaders highlighted how medicine can build bridges, signaling to a culture of growing antisemitism and the continuing Israel-Palestine conflict.
- Read more: Top Israeli hospital coming to Mass. with health care startup generator
Professor Eyal Zimlichman — who serves as deputy director general, chief medical officer, chief innovation officer and ARC co-founder at Sheba Medical Center — said approximately 125 companies, representing Israel, Belgium, Berlin, Singapore and other locations, have already expressed interest in the Boston site.
“ARC at large is very focused on digital health and health care transformation, so we’re looking for solutions that can really disrupt how we provide health care, can improve patient-centered care, can improve accessibility, can reduce cost considerably,” Zimlichman told MassLive this week. “So these are not solutions that would be moving the needle a little bit. These are transformative solutions, and digital health has that capacity.”
Sheba Medical Center recently earned one of the top ten spots in Newsweek/Statista’s World’s Best Smart Hospital rankings, alongside Massachusetts General Hospital.
- Read more: A hospital that fights antisemitism? This Israeli doctor wants to make it happen | John L. Micek
Sheba has the world’s first AI-powered emergency department that automatically gathers patient medical history, suggests relevant tests and helps doctors prioritize critical cases. All of Sheba staff receive training from an internal AI academy, and its AI accelerator programs — like the one coming to Boston — exist worldwide.
Developments coming out of the ARC accelerators in London, Melbourne, Singapore, Berlin and New Zealand include:
- Faster stroke detection in more than 1,400 hospitals
- An AI-driven clinical support platform for mental health and psychiatric care
- Technology that predicts which patients are most likely to suffer an adverse event associated with their medication, allowing pharmacists a chance at early intervention
- Ultrasounds with added AI features that will allow remote clinics, for example, to discover more, such as heart problems, plaques in arteries and enlarged organs
“We’re tackling the most critical challenges that health care is facing, whether it’s workforce crisis, whether it’s the rising costs, whether it’s accessibility and equity,” Zimlichman said.
The ARC program is looking for space in Boston for its March 2026 launch, likely in downtown or the Seaport. The selected companies will be announced in December.
They’ll have about three months to set up a Massachusetts business entity and relocate to Boston or hire local staff for the six-month program.
The ultimate goal is to see the Boston ARC program grow to 20 incoming companies each year, but Zimlichman predicted the inaugural cohort will start with five.
Opportunities for Mass. health care providers
There will be a considerable opportunity for Massachusetts health care providers to participate in the ARC program — through implementation.
The ARC companies will need to test and deploy their technology with local players, Zimlichman said, and the program is currently working to sign memorandums of understanding with “a very large number” of Massachusetts providers in not just Boston, but also the western part of the state and the north and south shores.
“Patients in Massachusetts will enjoy the technology very much early on before it becomes widespread across the country and the world,” Zimlichman said.
- Read more: Is Massachusetts keeping pace with the AI technology race?
It can be challenging for local health care systems to obtain funding specifically to launch research or pilot projects with new technology, he noted. To eliminate that barrier, the ARC program plans to provide research grants to Massachusetts institutions that agree to try out the technologies coming from ARC, a means of generating research to create evidence.
“There’s huge potential to bring a lot of businesses into the state, and we think that the potential is great to drive the economy, as well, and improve health care for the population,” Zimlichman said. “So this is something clearly that the government should also be interested to promote. And we are working with certain parts of government and the governor’s office in Massachusetts, of course, to bring this to action.”
In May, Healey said the state looked forward to the opening of the accelerator program as a “valued contribution in our innovation-based economy.”
“I’m sure it will result in new discoveries that will improve the world and save lives,” she said.
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