Scale Like a CEO

How AI is Saving Hospitals Millions in the Operating Room | Robert Brown

• Justin Reinert • Season 1 • Episode 58

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What if the operating room, the most complex and costly part of the hospital, finally became transparent? We sit down with Robert Brown, co-founder, president, and CTO of Omnimed, to unpack how AI can turn surgical chaos into clarity—without getting in the way of care. Robert explains how unbiased, real-time data reveals where cases slip, where turnover stalls, and where teams can safely move faster, giving surgeons, executives, and risk officers a shared source of truth.

We dig into the paradox that hospitals make most of their revenue in the OR while often losing money there. With margins under constant pressure and reimbursements lagging, efficiency is no longer a nice-to-have; it is survival. Robert shows how measuring what truly happens—start times, transitions, delays, equipment readiness—creates a feedback loop that improves outcomes and protects the bottom line. Instead of adding dashboards for the sake of dashboards, Omnimed focuses on actionable metrics that change decisions tomorrow morning.

Beyond technology, we explore the leadership playbook required to build healthcare products that stick. Robert shares candid lessons on letting go of old corporate habits, finding product-market fit in AI, and communicating value simply to different stakeholders. He talks about hiring people who think like owners, leading with humility over hype, and solving problems in the gray areas where playbooks run out. Recent recognition as a top AI healthcare company and growing interest from major systems signal real traction, but the core promise remains practical: safer surgeries, faster turnovers, and healthier hospital finances rooted in facts, not anecdotes.

If you care about surgical quality, operational excellence, and the future of healthcare AI, this conversation lays out a clear path from data to impact. Listen, share with a colleague who owns OR performance, and subscribe for more candid, actionable stories from builders at the edge of healthcare innovation.

Speaker:

How can data actually change surgical outcomes? Robert Brown, co-founder of Omnimed, is transforming the modern operating room with advanced artificial intelligence. His work helps hospitals decode complex performance metrics, bringing new clarity to surgical efficiency. This episode explores how Omnimed is using technology to redefine standards in healthcare. Robert, thank you so much for joining me on GELEC just to get us started.

Robert:

I'm Robert Brown. I'm the co-founder, president, and CTO for a company called Omnimed. And real simply, we put AI in the operating room, and we help hospital CEOs, surgeons, risk officers, clinical teams understand the performance of the place that really hospitals make 70% of the revenue. And through the data that we provide, we help them understand their performance and how they can change their outcomes.

Justin:

So that's great. I'd like to know a little bit more for a moment. What problems does it need your company to solve?

Robert:

And why did they have everyone? So hospitals, the operating room in the hospital, that's where they make 70% of their revenue. As we know. It's a very chaotic environment, a lot of things happening. It's a life-and-death situation. Very, very smart, very, very talented people within the room. But as human beings, we don't necessarily understand our own performance in the room. And when you look at the place where hospitals make their money, you can't ignore the financials. The average operating margin of a hospital is less than 2%. And so when you really look across the country of the 78,000 operating rooms, have a term called a going concern. Is a company able to make money? And at the end of the day, hospitals are losing money in the place that they make money. So we give them the data that typically is never captured or is never well understood because humans typically will capture it and they'll sort of put their own bias in. As an example, a case is supposed to start at 9 a.m. in the case when an hour over, there may be some clinical reasons why, but typically we see a lot of this just in terms of the inefficiencies of people in the room. So what we do is we help those decision makers, those people in control, understand their performance and how do they change that outcome? So they improve the clinical delivery, surgery that's being performed. But also at the end of the day is the hospital making money on the services that they provide, which right now is a big problem, but they're not. So that's that's something we really improve. And then we start talking about things like capitation, where I can't request reimbursement for the insurers that I'm looking for, and only 60% is being provided by those insurers back to the hospital for the cases they're delivering. They're only making 60 cents on the dollar. So at the end of the day, how do they improve their efficiency, reduce their costs, and improve their turnover to really improve those numbers? So that's the focus we really have.

Justin:

And if anything to help improving looking back at your transition as one of the co-founders, and then growing business, what biggest ships did you have them made?

Robert:

I think with any C-suite executive, you have your own experiences of starting and running startups. And then back before that, when we spent the 20, 25 years plus in the corporate world, we have a lot of resources, a lot of sort of predisposed strategies of what we want to do in building things. So we have a lot of sort of previous efforts and executions of the folks before us. And I think as you go forward, a lot of times the challenges of starting something new is letting go of some of the things in the past. Um, so as you build a business, how do you look at this thing called AI, which largely has been a shiny object for many, many people? And how do you rationalize it to a point that somebody says, I understand what to do with it, because in many cases you're predicting or preempting what people will do with the technology before they've ever done it? So you have to make sure that whatever business you're creating has market fit, has product or service fit, and that it's easily communicated in terms of the value proposition. So when you're doing something new, how do you let go of the things that the way we've done it? But how do you refine or redefine the way you're going to do it so people understand your product? How do you recruit people that can support that messaging? How do you evolve your product so it continues to add value? Because you should never build a product in search of a market. You should obviously identify a product that is in need or servicing the needs of a market. And that's something that's sometimes very difficult to do, especially in brand new segments like artificial intelligence.

Justin:

And so, in terms of letting go, what has been one of the hardest things for you to run?

Robert:

Oh gosh, the list could be very long, but you start every day at ground zero. So, how do you take where you're at today and how are we going to move the company forward the next day? How do you rationalize the goings-on of the marketplace, your competitors, the announcements, and you kind of feel like, gosh, there some of these people are doing things that we're doing? And so, how do you sort of maintain the drive and the focus, but also know that we're a firm believer is we don't have to be the biggest to be the best. So I think in many cases you check your ego, you have a big dose of humility in business, but you understand your business rather than you sort of forsake your business, which I think unfortunately a lot of executives do, is they don't step outside of the black and white of what a business appears to be and really address the gray areas, which are maybe we should do it this way, and how could we do it this way? And that's sort of like I hate to use the term of a lawyer, but lawyers exist because the black and white isn't exactly always the same for everybody. They're always the rationalization of what the black and white means, the law means in some cases. And so, as an executive, how do you figure out your customers, your market, your need? How do you take advantage of opportunities? How do you bring a certain amount of humility to the table? Um, but then rationalize with other folks that are on your team. This is the direction, these are the steps, these are the sequences that we will follow because this will be the path to success. A lot of times that is check your ego at the door, have a bit of humility and empathy, but have focus so you execute and you can be successful.

Justin:

I'm curious as you continue to grow, how much are you developing your strongment in the organization or say at least hiring?

Robert:

I think people are are obviously the greatest uh investment for a company's success. And so are they built from an organic path where they come in at a level and grow? Absolutely. Are they built by bringing in blood from the outside, so to say, where you're bringing in expertise and talents, points of views? I don't believe that everybody needs to be drinking from the same bin, if you will, because you want to have new ideas and new ways to approach opportunity because opportunity is always changing. Uh especially when you're dealing with investors. Investors go, I'm not investing in the product, I'm investing in you as the company, because your role is making sure that my investment is safe and your product is the custodian for that success. And if it doesn't, if the market doesn't buy it, what are you gonna do to protect my investment? So that's always a sort of a cultural part that's instilled, I think, or should be instilled in businesses is everybody's an investor in the business. Everybody has to move the business forward. And those that are the laggards, I think, that sort of say, well, I'm just here doing this, um, those are probably not the people that are gonna end up evolving with the business. But I think giving people the opportunity to evolve with the business by showing them the path that the company is moving forward on and illustrating the opportunities that can be created is an important part of management, not just the finger pointing that says, do this, do this, do that, or else. No, not at all. You've got to lead by example, lead by vision, and really make sense of some of the things that maybe others don't have the perspective on that you do as the C-suite. As you're bringing people into your organization, all of these well, certainly expertise, I think, in a discipline, whether they're engineers, whether they're sort of marketing or sales executives, business development, financial operations, logistics, you name it. There's the obvious disciplines. Any businesses like an NFL team, there's the quarterback, there's the linemen. Linemen probably don't make good quarterbacks, although sometimes they can make great running backs when they pick up a fumble when they're compelled to do so because they realize the prize. But I think bringing people in that have an understanding of your business, generally speaking, have an uh understanding of the direction of where the company is going and being able to see opportunity as a whole, maybe not every single specific opportunity, but an understanding and a desire to be a part of, right, the business. It's not just the brand that sits on your lapel or on the front of the building. Um, the brand is really the culture and what we're doing and what we're doing to change. I had an opportunity to work for Apple and Steve Jobs and many of the things that he had to say were very, very inspirational things, but he also made it very simple for us all to understand, which was very compelling to say, I can do that. I'm motivated by that. And so, as much as I like to talk, and certainly I'm doing so on this session here, I think the reality is just being able to set an expectation of here's where we're going, here's how your talents apply, here's the path for you and your job and your role, give you the reins to do it, right? Give you the tools to succeed. And again, where those people may or may not work out, you make changes, certainly that that's part of life. It's nothing meant to be personal, it's all business. But at the end of the day, giving people that opportunity and seeing what people are capable of doing through conversation, through engagement, that's really what we look for in each of the disciplines that we hire. And what I've done to had an opportunity to do in lead teams in the past.

Justin:

I'm not working, I'm I'm dropping honor is line. All the decisions have been over.

Robert:

Oh boy. If employees ever knew, sometimes the daily things that executives go through, they'd probably run for the hills because we're human beings too, just like the people that we work with on our team. I think one of the things you have to do is be able to step back from problems and say, as I kind of mentioned before, there's always the black and white. This is how I solve it or this is how I don't solve it. But I think a lot of people need to understand there may be multiple ways to solve it, maybe kind of back in that gray area. And the job that everybody should have is how do I figure out how to do that? But those can be scary times. You don't necessarily want to go to your team and go, guys, I don't know how we're gonna make payroll next week because everybody will run for the hills. But what you do is you figure it out. And if there ever was an expression, whatever it takes, it's something I live by, where I can spend my time being upset or concerned or stressed or afraid of an issue, and I can burn that energy kind of sitting there and saying, Wow, gee, gosh, how did that happen? Or I can burn that same energy trying to solve the problem and say, okay, this is what we have to do, figure it out, because the amount of time that you would spend figuring it out versus wallowing in it to then figure it out doubles the amount of time to solve the problem. So I think you've got to have a certain amount of flexibility, a certain amount of skills, a certain amount of humility, but also the understanding that you may not be able to solve it alone. You may have to reach out to others and say, this is what I'm looking to do, how do I do it? Um, and so that can be the challenge always as an executive.

Speaker:

Thank you for that.

Robert:

So, what the future look like for Monte? Well, I think personally it's very bright. We were very grateful this past week is that we were voted best AI company from a company called Octane, which is like a Y combinator. They're an ecosystem based in Southern California that works with some of the biggest in healthcare Edwards, Life Sciences, Massimo, Medtronic, Stryker, all the big ones. And they really bring together an ecosystem of service providers and bankers and legal experts and technology experts to really help fuel innovation because Southern California is really a hub of innovation because we have a lot of it going on here. So we were just recognized as the best AI technology for healthcare, which was great. So we gave our little speech up on stage. Um, in terms of what we're doing and how we're doing it, you begin to attract the interest of companies like Johns Hopkins, Husteris, and many others and some of the big healthcare players, and the list is sort of long, and they and you actually get that globally, you're on the right track. It can be maddening sometimes when you start this. We say we're an overnight sensation, seven years in the making. But at the end of the day, you've got to refine your message from what you think the vision is and what the market needs and continually refine that can be very, very frustrating. But once you hit that sort of nerve of what the market really understands, what you do and how it solves their problem, especially when you're an innovator and an inventor like we are at Omnimad, it's great to tell the story because people go, oh boy, wow. I got to be on a team that launched the very first smartphone. I'm not sure if you know what that product is. Everybody in the world certainly understands it. But I my job is to run around and tell the country here's what you're going to do by putting the internet on a cell phone. So the opportunity to really get out in front of a market and tell people what you're doing and how you're doing it, and educate customers and users of how things will be done. The future is very bright when people begin to go, oh, okay, I definitely see the need for what you're doing. And that's an exciting time. And those opportunities sometimes don't come very often, they come close. But I think right now with where we're heading, and the future is very, very bright for us.

Justin:

Congratulations on the folks, let me get in touch with you. What's the best look of you for?

Robert:

You can certainly reach us at if you go to our website omnimed, www.omnimed.ai. We're certainly on LinkedIn. All of our profiles are up there as the executive team. Happy to make conversation part of what I always enjoyed in my path of being in the C-suite is I'd reach out to others because I'm insanely curious about opportunities. And so I'm happy to help and support anybody else that's insanely curious about how to be successful. You definitely want to stay away from the folks that are always trying to sell you something and try and get out in front of them and push something at you. Look, let's have a conversation about how you can improve because what I can also learn from you as an older guy would be very good as well, too, because there's a lot of very smart young people coming up. And again, learning from each other is extremely important. So I make myself available and I help other executives and startup CEOs understand their company, not their product, which sometimes can be very difficult, especially when they're out raising money and trying to build teams and stuff like that. So yeah, we're happy to do so.

Justin:

Great. Robert, thank you so much. I've enjoyed the conversation.

Robert:

My pleasure. Anytime. Thanks, Joseph.