Insider Brief
- Stepful, an AI-powered healthcare workforce training platform, has raised $55 million in Series C funding led by Oak HC/FT, with participation from Foresite Capital, Hearst Ventures, the Citi Impact Fund, SemperVirens, Y Combinator, Intermountain Health, and ECMC Education Impact Fund, having now graduated more than 32,000 healthcare workers since founding.
- The platform delivers employer-sponsored, debt-free training pathways directly to health systems — replacing legacy trade school models — targeting a market where U.S. health systems spend $97 billion annually on contract staffing due to an inadequate credentialing and training pipeline, with clients including Mount Sinai, Ochsner, and Providence.
- Founded by CEO Carl Madi, Tressia Hobeika, and Edoardo Serra, Stepful will use the funding to expand health system partnerships, launch advanced degree programs in nursing, respiratory therapy, and imaging, and accelerate its AI capabilities across instruction, simulation, assessment, and workforce planning.
PRESS RELEASE — Stepful, a training platform that is redefining how America’s largest health systems build, train, and retain their workforce, has announced $55 million in Series C funding. The round was led by Oak HC/FT, with participation from new investors Foresite Capital, Hearst Ventures, and the Citi Impact Fund, alongside existing investors SemperVirens, Y Combinator, Intermountain Health, and ECMC Education Impact Fund.
The raise follows a defining year for Stepful. In addition to meaningful revenue growth, the organization has now graduated more than 32,000 practice-ready healthcare workers since its founding.
The structural problems are well-documented. Legacy trade schools operate under enrollment caps and manual workflows that cannot keep pace with growing healthcare demand for workers. Health systems, in turn, have grown dependent on contract staffing, spending $97 billion annually, largely because the credentialing and training pipeline has never been built to scale.
In response to these challenges, Stepful has built a vertically-integrated platform that delivers school-as-a-service to health systems, replacing low-tech, human-bottlenecked processes with an always-on training and intelligence layer. By offering employer-sponsored, debt-free pathways, the platform enables workers to move from a high school diploma to a six-figure healthcare career without leaving the workforce, commuting to college campuses, or taking on burdensome loans to attend legacy trade schools.
“Stepful is not just a training platform — we are the foundational infrastructure for the future of the healthcare workforce,” said Carl Madi, CEO and Co-Founder of Stepful. “This capital allows us to expand our partnerships with hospitals and health systems, launch advanced degree programs in nursing, respiratory therapy, and imaging, and accelerate our AI capabilities.”
Stepful’s proprietary platform works across every dimension of clinical education, from instruction and simulation to assessment and workforce planning. The result is a compounding flywheel in which every student interaction, clinical outcome, and employer data signal makes the system smarter, faster, and more defensible over time.
“Stepful is the only company we have seen that combines online education with a sophisticated AI engine to solve the talent supply problem at scale,” said Vig Chandramouli, Partner at Oak HC/FT. “This team has sustained an extraordinary pace of growth, with 35+ major healthcare system clients, including Mount Sinai, Ochsner, and Providence. Our continued investment reflects our conviction in both the leadership and the platform they’ve built.”
This funding will accelerate the deployment of Stepful’s platform across an expanded healthcare system partnerships and new degree program verticals, including RN and imaging, as the company scales toward category leadership in healthcare talent infrastructure.
About Stepful
Stepful offers accelerated, affordable training for healthcare careers. Through partnerships with providers nationwide, Stepful connects graduates directly to job opportunities after certification. Founded by Carl Madi, Tressia Hobeika, and Edoardo Serra, Stepful is building the next generation of allied health professionals. For more information, visit www.stepful.com.
About Oak HC/FT
Oak HC/FT is a venture and growth equity firm specializing in investments in fintech and healthcare. Using partnership as a foundation, Oak HC/FT guides companies and founders at every stage, from seed to growth, to create businesses that make a measurable and lasting impact. Founded in 2014, Oak HC/FT has invested in 100 portfolio companies and more than $7 billion in assets under management. Oak HC/FT is headquartered in Stamford, CT, with an office in San Francisco, CA. Follow Oak HC/FT on LinkedIn and X and learn more at oakhcft.com.
Contacts
Jackie Kahn
Oak HC/FT
[email protected]
