Key Points
- Family office dealmakers have yet to pick up the pace even as the end of the year draws near.
- But investment firms of billionaires, including those of Jeff Bezos and Bernard Arnault, are still banking on AI health-care startups.
- For family offices looking to tap into the AI boom and make an impact, investing in health-tech is an attractive strategy.
A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide to the high-net-worth investor and consumer. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox. While deal-making on Wall Street typically picks up in the fourth quarter, the investment firms of the ultra-rich appear to be in no hurry to close deals by year-end. In November, family offices made 55 direct investments in companies, down 5% from the prior month, according to data provided exclusively to CNBC by private wealth platform Fintrx. This tally is also a 37.5% drop on an annual basis, in line with this year’s muted deal-making , as family offices grapple with tariff uncertainty and geopolitical conflict. That said, November was a busy month for Jeff Bezos ‘ eponymous family office. Bezos Expeditions made at least four direct investments, including co-leading a $106 million round for Profluent. The biotech startup uses generative artificial intelligence for gene-editing. A slew of billionaire family offices are also investing in the potential of AI to improve how diseases are tracked and treated. Aglaé Ventures, the firm of LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault, joined a $298 million Series B round for Function Health, which provides regular lab testing for health tracking and early disease detection. Roku ‘s billionaire founder Anthony Wood and NBA star Blake Griffin also participated in the fundraise. John Doerr’s Foris Group and Kleiner Perkins, the venture capital firm he managed until 2016, invested in a $126 million round for Hippocratic AI. Now valued at $3.5 billion, Hippocratic AI develops AI agents that conduct non-diagnostic services like medication reminders and surgery follow-ups. Indian tech tycoon Azim Premji’s namesake family office was also part of Series C round. For family offices looking to tap into the AI boom and make an impact with their investments, backing health-tech firms is an attractive strategy. In a survey of 317 global family offices by UBS, 65% identified pharmaceutical and biotechnology as top sectors to benefit from AI, second only to banking and financial services, which 75% selected. Health-care equipment and services were the third most popular beneficiary, with 62%. Almost half of the sample reported having health technologies and innovation in their portfolios. At a panel in October, Bezos warned of an AI bubble , but said scientific and technological breakthroughs would endure the burst. He compared it to the biotech bubble of the ’90s. “When the dust settles and you see who are the winners, society benefits from those inventions. They still get those life-saving drugs,” he said. “And that’s what’s going to happen here, too. This is real. The benefits to society from AI are going to be gigantic.”
