Driving Innovation in Dental Healthcare

Expertise. Opportunities. Capital.

Our goal is to improve dental healthcare by identifying and evaluating investment opportunities to support the growth of our portfolio companies and improve oral care.

About Us

For dentists, by dentists, involving dentists expertise

Dental Innovation Fund partners with organizations at the beginning of their growth journey, and we seek to identify companies best positioned to improve the delivery of dental healthcare.

Our strategy leverages both an extensive background in fund management and expertise in the dental industry. Our unique model also will include dental practitioners and both investors and market experts as we evaluate and pilot opportunities.

The current surge of investments in the dental space by venture capital and private equity firms has created opportunities to improve value through advancements in technology, business models, products, services and practice management.

  • 172

    Number of Organizations

  • 333

    Number of Funding Rounds

  • $1.6B

    Total Funding Amount

  • $54B

    Estimated size of the non-practice market

Approach

The Fund represents a new opportunity to advance dental innovation. With the goal of organizing a large group of like-minded investors, innovators, researchers, industry partners, and other participants, the Fund hopes to play an instrumental role in the formation of a national ecosystem focused on commercializing innovations focused on the field of dentistry.

Our strategy is to apply our proprietary value creation model to commercialize a pipeline of early-stage opportunities in order to develop dental related solutions across a spectrum of categories. To execute on its thesis, the Fund will deploy: pre-seed investments to form and start-up new ventures (innovation); seed investments to advance innovation stage investments toward or through regulatory approvals and/or product launch (incubation); and series A investments to increase growth (acceleration).

Team

  • Eric V. Trappen

    Managing Director

    Today Eric is principal at his strategy and innovation consultancy Perspicacity Group, which focuses on innovation, growth and building value in businesses regardless of their size. For the past 25 years, he has applied his consultation experience and knowledge to C-level executives from the fortune 500 through participating in the commercialization and exit strategies for 10 start-ups.

    Eric has bachelor's degrees in mathematics, Finance, Business and Economics, as well as two master's degrees in business (MBA) and a MIS in Computer Science from institutions such as Carnegie Mellon University, Robert Morris University, and the University of Pittsburgh. Eric has been an adjunct professor of entrepreneurship and entrepreneur in residence and speaker at ASU and Thunderbird School of Management giving presentations on entrepreneurship, venture funding and building value in growing companies.

    Having moved to Arizona to care for his mother suffering with MS, he has had direct experience with many support and healthcare organizations. Because of his experience and professional involvement with numerous nonprofits, he identified many inefficiencies within the current systems, and identified opportunities to improve processes in those industries.

  • Dr. Michael S. Cavender, DDS

    Partner

    Michael S. Cavender, DDS is an endodontist that has been practicing dentistry for over 30 years. Dr. Cavender has extensive training and knowledge of the physiology of pain. Through his specialty education and years of private clinical practice, he has developed an understanding of the pharmacology of pain management. While being a full-time educator in the field of endodontics, he developed an affinity for research and development. Dr. Cavender has always practiced with the latest and most advanced technologies. The answer to a fuller and better life is through innovation.

  • Christopher Grose

    Partner

    Christopher Grose is a product designer and engineer who specializes in lean manufacturing and scalable solutions. As a founding lead in multiple ventures across life science and industrial sectors, Christopher has experience bridging the gap between design, engineering, and manufacturing to bring life to solutions. User focus separates a product from its competitors, but manufacturability determines how it will dominate the market.

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