NM Invests $844K in Next Competitive Advantage: Coordinated Healthcare Innovation through HealthInno

Healthcare in New Mexico is not a side sector. It is the state’s second-largest industry and a central force in workforce stability, rural access, and long-term economic strength. 

Leaders across the state also know the next chapter of healthcare won’t be built on technology alone. It will be built on decisions that fit how teams actually work—guided by clinicians, grounded in operations, and aligned with sustainability.  

And yet, when it comes to innovation, New Mexico has too often moved one organization at a time. A clinic tests a tool. A health system tries working with a startup but runs into operational challenges. Another team starts over with a different vendor. Too often, the evaluation burden stays local—even when the challenges are shared statewide.  

We’re building a more coordinated way forward. 

In a landmark moment for New Mexico’s innovation agenda, HealthInno has secured $844,000 through the FY26 New Mexico Entrepreneurship Programmatic Support Grant from the New Mexico Economic Development Department to launch and operationalize Health ImpACT—a first-of-its-kind health innovation pilot and learning network.  

This is not an accelerator or a one-time event. It’s a coordinated, structured effort to support New Mexico healthcare organizations as they explore how to strengthen healthcare through startup partnerships and advanced computing technologies (ACT)—including AI, analytics, and digital tools—in ways that fit New Mexico’s care settings.  

Why This Matters for New Mexico 

Healthcare leaders across New Mexico are navigating workforce shortages, operational complexity, and an expanding set of technology options—alongside growing expectations around AI and advanced computing. Capacity is limited. Decisions have to be deliberate.  

New Mexico is also a uniquely practical place to learn what holds up. Our care landscape spans rural and remote communities, Tribal providers, academic medicine, and urban systems. If a solution can fit here—across this range of settings—it’s more likely to be durable over time.  

Advanced computing holds promise. What matters is whether it reduces burden, strengthens operations, and supports better care delivery under the conditions teams are working in every day.  

A Coordinated Pathway for Evaluation 

For the first time, New Mexico healthcare organizations will have a shared structure to explore and pilot ACT solutions through structured 3–6 month pilots—with healthcare organizations deciding what to try, when to try it, and what happens next.  

Within the innovation pilot network: 

• Healthcare leaders identify shared priority challenges. 

• HealthInno sources and vets relevant advanced computing approaches. 

• Organizations opt into scoped, 3–6-month pilots when aligned. 

• Outcomes and feasibility are evaluated in real-world conditions. 

• Each organization independently determines the next steps. 

Instead of isolated experiments, this creates a repeatable approach for shared learning across the state—without requiring uniform adoption. 

Participation is optional and organization-led. The purpose is shared visibility and shared learning, so teams can reduce duplicated effort and move forward with more confidence. 

For Healthcare Executives 

If you are a CEO, CMO, CIO, COO, or senior clinical or operational leader at a New Mexico provider organization or health plan, this network is designed to support informed decision-making. 

It enables you and your organization to: 

• Gain experience with startup diligence and partnership 

• Help shape statewide innovation priorities 

• Review a curated set of relevant technology approaches 

• Pilot solutions with defined scope and clear endpoints 

• Evaluate impact before making longer-term commitments 

The goal is to reduce duplication, protect scarce resources, and create clearer signals about what works in New Mexico settings. 

As Angelica Maestas, Founder of HealthInno, said: 

“Healthcare is central to New Mexico’s future… What’s been missing is coordinated infrastructure to bring resources, partners, and capital into the state while also building from within.”  

This work strengthens care delivery and long-term stability through coordinated learning and practical evaluation. 

For Technology Startups and Innovators 

For founders building in AI, workflow automation, interoperability, advanced modeling, sensing, or cloud-scale healthcare platforms, meaningful validation inside real clinical and operational environments is often the hardest milestone to reach. Selling into healthcare is complex. Proving value in live settings is even harder. 

Health ImpACT was built to close that gap. 

We are recruiting startups nationally — including New Mexico-based founders — that have raised $1M+ and demonstrated early traction. This threshold isn’t about exclusivity; it’s about ensuring solutions are stable enough for real-world evaluation and pilot execution inside active healthcare environments. 

We’re especially focused on pilot-ready companies that are either: 

• FDA-cleared (when applicable), or 

• Not FDA-regulated (software/workflow/data platforms that can deploy without clearance) 

• Not a fit (at this time): companies whose solution is dependent on pending FDA clearance/approval or clinical trial outcomes to demonstrate value. 

Health ImpACT Offers a Structured Pathway To: 

• Align healthcare settings to clearly defined use cases 

• Establish scoped pilot parameters and realistic timelines 

• Coordinate evaluation pathways across clinical, operational, and leadership stakeholders 

• Define measurable success criteria before deployment 

• Create repeatable pilot-to-adoption frameworks 

This is not a demo day. It’s deployment infrastructure. 

So what kinds of innovations are we actively looking to deploy and evaluate? Health ImpACT focuses on six applied categories where advanced computing can improve care delivery and healthcare operations in measurable, time-bound pilots: 

The Six Priority Innovation Categories 

1) Extending Care Across Distance — Tools that support virtual-first workflows, home-based care, and continuity across rural/underserved settings (beyond basic video visits). 

2) Enhancing Operations Intelligence — AI-enabled workflow + data systems that help teams act on real-time signals, route work, and reduce admin friction. 

3) Identifying Health Signals Earlier — Wearables/lightweight sensing that track change over time and turn signals into usable insights (not consumer-only gadgets). 

4) Training & Immersive Support — AR/VR for workforce training, remote expertise, and rehab support that fits real care pathways (not one-off demos). 

5) Population & Data Modeling — “What-if” simulation and advanced analytics to test decisions before rollout and improve pathways and capacity planning. 

6) Next-Gen System Decision Support — Advanced computing (including HPC and quantum-inspired methods) for complex system-wide planning, optimization, and large-scale pattern finding. 

New Mexico is becoming a practical proving ground where healthcare leaders and innovators co-design real-world pilots for rural and resource-constrained settings—so founders can move beyond pitch decks into deployment that lasts. That’s why this work is being built for New Mexico. 

Built for New Mexico 

This innovation pilot and learning network is being developed in collaboration with Builders VC, UNM Health Sciences, rural and remote healthcare organizations, statewide provider associations, and a growing network of New Mexico healthcare advisors.  

That grounding matters. Innovation that reflects local context is more likely to stick—and more likely to improve care and sustainability over time.  

A Coordinated Step Forward 

This work reflects a new level of alignment: between healthcare and economic development, between advanced computing and care delivery, and between innovation and accountability.  

New Mexico is building a coordinated way to explore new technology and partnership models—through shared priorities, structured pilots, and collective learning.  

For healthcare leaders ready to help set direction. 
For partners ready to show up to New Mexico’s priorities. 
For a state committed to strengthening healthcare through coordinated innovation. 

Interested in Participating? 

Health ImpACT is now welcoming healthcare organizations for the 2026 innovation pilot and learning network. Tell us your priority areas and we’ll follow up with next steps and timing. 

Healthcare organizations and startups can learn more at: https://healthinno.io/impact 

This is where New Mexico healthcare leaders set direction—and where advanced computing moves from promise to practice.