| What to expect at this year’s D.C. event
| Note: Aging in America News is a media sponsor of the summit. Mary Furlong & Associates is a sponsor of Aging in America News’ Aging 15 project, through a barter arrangement.
On December 1 and 2, Mary Furlong & Associates will hold the ninth annual What’s Next Longevity Innovation Summit at the National Press Club in Washington. The organizers cap attendance at about 200 people and say the summit has sold out the past three years. This year’s theme is “The Power of Caring.” The guest list is a mix of entrepreneurs, investors, government officials, nonprofit leaders, analysts and journalists.
Who it’s for
This is a business-of-aging convening – a place for “deal flow,” funding and distribution partnerships – more than a caregiving support gathering. Family caregivers are the subject of the conversation, but they are not the intended audience. The field needs people who can build and finance solutions.
What’s on the agenda
Based on the organizers’ preview, the program leans toward the practical and the policy-driven. Sessions will cover:
- Caregiver training and the federal GUIDE model for dementia care.
- What has been added as covered benefits in Medicare Advantage plans.
- How to work with employers, care navigators and home care agencies.
- What senior living operators want from AgeTech, CareTech and DementiaTech.
- How state offices on aging are changing in some markets.
- How to ride out tariff and interest-rate volatility.
- How to find funders, including government sources such as the National Institute on Aging.
Bob Blancato of Matz, Blancato and Associates, a longtime presence in aging policy circles (and a member of Aging in America News’ advisory council), will discuss how the midterm elections may reshape priorities on Capitol Hill for aging and caregiving. The keynote speaker is Jeffrey Cole, director of the Center for the Digital Future at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. He will draw on his new book, Disrupters at the Gate, about change arriving from unexpected places.
Numbers to keep in mind
- 63 million family caregivers in the U.S., with dementia caregiving making up 29 percent of that group and projected to nearly double by 2050.
- $648 billion Care Economy
- $12.5 trillion longevity economy
The state of play
According to Furlong, investors are becoming more selective. They want scalable software, recurring revenue, strong margins and a credible path to profitability. They also want proof that a company can turn pilots into paying deployments.
Anyone who has watched promising aging-care startups stall between a pilot and a purchase order knows that’s the central tension. Care is labor-intensive, and investors increasingly want software economics. Whether those two things can be reconciled, and who pays when they can’t, remains an open question.
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