#348 - Marco Benitez, CEO of Rook - on transforming health data into enterprise value.

This podcast interview focuses on the entrepreneurial journey to transform messy wearable data into standardized enterprise gold. My guest is Marco Benitez, CEO of Rook.

Marco is a tech entrepreneur on a mission. He's a former Taekwondo champion who transformed his athletic discipline into entrepreneurial success.

At just 22 years old (while still in college), he and his co-founder built a machine learning system for hospitals, which they successfully sold in 2006. This got him involved in clinical research - thereby working for pharmaceutical giants like Roche and Novartis. This is where stumbled across big challenges that were caused by the absence of enough meaningful health data.

And this became the founding idea behind ROOK, which he founded in June 2017. What began as a heart rate monitoring platform in 2018 evolved into a sophisticated B2B platform that now integrates with over 300 wearable devices.

Their vision: to create a healthier world by making health data accessible and meaningful.

And this inspired me, and hence I invited Marco to my podcast. We explore the journey of building a groundbreaking health data platform. Marco tells the story how COVID destroyed their fitness-center business model, and what lessons he learned in the process of pivoting. He shares his insights on enterprise sales cycles, pricing strategy, and team building. Last but not least he explains how he's deliberately portraying the startup's challenges to find the right cultural fit and his mantra of "cut through the noise and keep walking" when it comes to facing tough decisions.

Here's one of his quotes

Once you switch your mind, instead of selling a product, you are selling data, and you are really selling a problem, that's when they put your price on you. Because if you are selling a very good solution to their problem, that's when they will say, ‘This is a no-brainer. I don't care how much you are going to charge me.’

During this interview, you will learn four things:

1. What insights changed their ability to charge premium prices in enterprise deals? 2. What's he's doubling down on successfully to shorten the typically long sales cycles. 3. Why he emphasizes radical transparency, sharing financials and challenges with potential hires. 4. His secrets to staying persistent and disciplined, even when facing doubts or lack of motivation

For more information about the guest from this week:

Marco Benitez • Website: Rook •