A Unicorn Built on Grit, Genius, and Equity
In a gleaming 15-story tower in downtown Atlanta, a health revolution is unfolding—one not driven by Silicon Valley elites or Wall Street giants, but by a 36-year-old visionary who refused to wait for permission to lead.
Jasmine Lee, founder and CEO of CuraHealth, has become the first Black woman to launch a unicorn in healthtech—a feat that challenges not just business norms, but historic inequalities across medicine, tech, and finance. With a valuation of $1.2 billion and growing, CuraHealth is transforming how underserved communities access digital care through AI-powered diagnostics, telehealth, and culturally competent health platforms.
“It’s not just about building a company,” Lee says. “It’s about building a system that sees people—really sees them.”
From West Baltimore to the Boardroom: Jasmine’s Early Journey
Born and raised in West Baltimore, Jasmine Lee grew up in the shadow of systemic inequities—poor access to health care, underfunded schools, and the loss of her mother to an undiagnosed heart condition at 47.
“My mother didn’t die because there wasn’t a cure,” she often says. “She died because nobody listened.”
Fueled by grief and determination, Lee earned a scholarship to Johns Hopkins, where she majored in biomedical engineering. After a stint in hospital systems design at GE Healthcare, she earned her MPH at Emory University and began mapping the flaws in the American health system—especially for Black, Indigenous, and lower-income populations.
The solution, she believed, wasn’t more hospitals or longer waits—it was accessible, smart, and human-centered digital care.
The Spark: CuraHealth’s Bold Mission
In 2020, Lee launched CuraHealth from a co-working space in Atlanta with one mission: bridge the healthcare gap for marginalized communities using digital tools that meet people where they are.
Her first prototype? A text-based AI chatbot called CuraBot that offered free symptom triage and local health resource recommendations. It was designed for people without smartphones or fluent medical literacy.
After a pilot in rural Georgia, where CuraBot helped hundreds access testing during the COVID-19 pandemic, Lee realized she was onto something bigger.
Innovation Meets Empathy: Building the CuraHealth Ecosystem
Today, CuraHealth offers a full-stack platform that includes:
- CuraBot 3.0 – a multilingual AI diagnostic assistant trained on racially diverse datasets.
- CuraConnect – a HIPAA-compliant telehealth app integrated with community clinics.
- CuraInsights – a predictive health analytics engine helping local health systems allocate resources equitably.
- CuraCare+ – a subscription plan offering 24/7 nurse chat, mental health counseling, and prescription delivery for under $15/month.
CuraHealth doesn’t just serve users—it partners with community health centers, local pharmacies, and churches, embedding itself within the cultural and logistical fabric of the people it aims to reach.
“We design with—not for—communities,” Lee insists. “If your tech doesn’t work for a grandma in the Delta without broadband, it doesn’t work.”
Cracking the Code—and the Glass Ceiling
Raising capital as a Black woman in healthtech wasn’t easy. For her first two years, Lee was told repeatedly that her “market” wasn’t big enough. In 2022, she pitched over 70 VCs before receiving her first major check: a $3M seed round from Backstage Capital and Harlem Capital.
By 2024, CuraHealth had grown to over 2 million users and caught the attention of global players. Her $50M Series B—led by Sequoia Capital and Andreessen Horowitz—marked a historic moment: the largest single VC round ever raised by a Black woman in U.S. healthtech.
“They weren’t just investing in Jasmine,” says Sequoia partner Maria Liao. “They were investing in the future of equitable healthcare.”
Real-World Impact: Lives Changed by CuraHealth
CuraHealth isn’t just a digital success—it’s changing lives.
- In Mississippi, maternal health deserts now rely on CuraConnect for prenatal care guidance and virtual doulas.
- In Chicago’s South Side, mental health access tripled after CuraCare+ launched Spanish-language therapy options.
- In Tribal communities in Arizona, CuraBot was retrained with Indigenous health experts to better recognize culturally specific symptoms and responses.
A recent CDC-backed study showed that counties using CuraHealth tech saw a 17% drop in ER visits for preventable conditions over 12 months.
“This is what tech should do,” Lee says. “Solve problems, not just optimize profits.”
Workforce Equity: Building a New Kind of Health Company
Internally, Lee runs CuraHealth with the same ethos: equity, access, and inclusion.
- Over 68% of staff identify as Black, Brown, or Indigenous.
- Employee ownership is baked into hiring contracts.
- The company partners with HBCUs and community colleges to pipeline students into tech and clinical operations roles.
Her Atlanta headquarters includes an on-site childcare center and a wellness room named after her late mother, Elaine.
“We can’t heal a broken system with broken workplaces,” Lee notes. “Cura isn’t just what we build. It’s how we build it.”
The Road Ahead: AI, Advocacy, and Global Scale
In 2025, CuraHealth is expanding into Nigeria, Brazil, and the Philippines, adapting its AI to serve local health infrastructure gaps. The company also recently launched CuraPolicy, an advocacy division helping governments draft ethical healthtech regulation.
Their latest innovation? CuraSense, a wearable-free vitals tracker that works through smartphones using facial scan biomarkers—a game-changer for home diagnostics in low-resource environments.
But Lee is not resting on her unicorn status.
“The billion-dollar milestone is symbolic,” she says. “Our real success is when Black women stop being the exception in this industry.”
Legacy in the Making: More Than a Milestone
Jasmine Lee’s story isn’t just about founding a unicorn—it’s about reshaping who gets to lead innovation. She’s been compared to Oprah, Melinda Gates, and Reshma Saujani, but her blueprint is entirely her own: part technologist, part public health leader, part disruptor of systemic bias.
She’s turned CuraHealth into a case study in what happens when empathy and engineering collide—and has paved a path for future founders to follow.
“I didn’t break a ceiling,” she says with a quiet smile. “I built a door.”