Frontera founder Amol Deshpande stands outside the company’s new downtown Denver office. (Max Scheinblum/BusinessDen)
Amol Deshpande’s son was struggling.
At 2 years old, he was nonverbal, toe walking and wouldn’t respond to his name.
The now-13-year-old was eventually diagnosed with autism. But figuring that out was a struggle too.
“It was very hard to find somebody who had expertise in this, who could diagnose it, who could do it in a relatively expeditious manner such that we could do the early intervention that we knew was so critical,” he said. “So we were hodgepodging what we could together, trying to get a diagnosis. It was a very challenging process.”
The entrepreneur, who founded the ag-tech firm Farmers Business Network, ended up paying around $5,500 for a private diagnosis. The full report came eight weeks after the process started.
Still, the therapies paid off.
“Today, he talks better than 54% of kids,” he said. “You wouldn’t usually say, ‘Oh, your kid’s in the 54th percentile on something, and that’s the most amazing thing.’ But it’s someone who never spoke, and now they speak better than 54% of most kids.”
Many families can’t afford that cost in money or time.
So, in 2023, Deshpande founded Frontera to help clinicians diagnose more kids faster. The company recently raised $32 million, backed by coastal firms Lux Capital, Lightspeed, Bison Ventures, Menlo Ventures and Inspired Capital.
“The therapies and the interventions work, yet most of the people who need them don’t get them,” he said. “And I know that the health care system has a lot of that, but I would say in the early childhood development space and in autism, it is probably most severe when you look at the seriousness of the condition.”
Frontera uses its artificial intelligence software to assess and help diagnose children with potential developmental delays at a fraction of the price and time. Deshpande said its software can infer and draw conclusions from behaviors, much like a clinician would, and package them into complex reports.
“And what that does is it gets leverage to that clinician who has 10 times more demand than they could meet,” Deshpande said. “If we can get the report writing and other stuff down, then they can take more cases.”
The technology can also process video from therapy sessions. Clinicians can record using a phone or tablet, and Frontera will analyze everything from speech, movement and interactions with people and toys.
“For the first time ever, you can extract clinical data from video. So, you take a video of a child in therapy, and you can extract 30 frames a second of data points,” Deshpande said. “And what that means is a level of precision and data that was never before even close to possible.”
Grant Sickle, left, and Amol Deshpande during a demo of Frontera’s tech. (Max Scheinblum/BusinessDen)
“Instead of a clinician perhaps overseeing 15 clients, we want to get to a place where they can oversee 30 or 60, but not (have) any more stress on them,” said Grant Sickle, Frontera’s director of product.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, around 9% of children have a developmental disability. Deshpande said around 3% to 5% of boys are diagnosed with autism. Many of those kids could spend up to a year on wait lists to diagnose their delays.
“I actually think the problem is massively underestimated … because when you get an early intervention done with a kid, that affects the next 90 years of their life,” Desphande said.
“We have a lot of drugs under development for Alzheimer’s and dementia to extend useful life by a couple of years, but there isn’t a single drug under development for a 2-year-old who doesn’t talk,” he added. “That child will need complete care for the rest of their lives if there’s no intervention.”
Deshpande said most of the $32 million raised will go toward tech development. Though the service already operates profitably, he said bettering it requires hiring more people and upping computing power.
“There’s a long way to go to get the cost down, to continue to improve the efficacy of the technology on an accuracy basis, and build those modules we talked about,” he said. “But we’re very confident at this point that that’s where we’re headed.”
This isn’t the first health-tech venture for Deshpande.
Through his family office, Divergent Investments, he has helped finance several medical startups, including Soar Autism Center, a care facility with several locations in Colorado and Arizona, and Manatee, a Denver company that helps streamline family mental health care.
He moved to Denver in 2022 from San Francisco, citing a Bay Area “buzz” that never quite returned to its pre-pandemic levels. He also said the Mile High environment was better for his two sons, who were going into their preteen years.
“There is vibrancy in terms of the talent pools, but there’s also a lot of frivolousness and flakiness,” he said of the Bay Area, where he lived for 15 years. “People switch jobs monthly, almost, it feels like. You’re the next hot thing, or you’re not the next hot thing. I think there is a sanctity to building here that is different, and I’ve actually really enjoyed it.”
Deshpande started Farmers Business Network, the agricultural e-commerce firm, in 2014. Though he left in early 2023 before starting Frontera, he still is a shareholder. Before that, he worked for VC firm Kleiner Perkins in the Bay Area.
“I’ve been an early-stage entrepreneur almost my whole life, and FBN was an opportunity to build and grow a huge business. We were 1,000 employees when I left,” Deshpande said. “We’re ramping up here. I think (Frontera) will be bigger.”
The company uses a consumption pricing model rather than a subscription, and Deshpande said he is making it available to anyone who wants it — even potential competitors.
“If someone’s going to try to get more kids into care, get them diagnosed, we will make sure that they have access to this technology on reasonable terms,” he said.
In the future, he sees the company delving into all types of behavioral health issues. But for now, not even a month out of stealth, the company is focusing on tackling the diagnosis that sparked its founding.
“The early childhood issues tend to be in the shadows relative to issues of the brain with the elderly or other types of issues like obesity or cancer, which people are very public about,” he said. “Autism is wrought with conspiracy theories and random points of view, and it lacks precision. I think if we bring precision to it, it’ll change the game.”
Inside Frontera’s new office at 1517 Blake St. in Denver. (Max Scheinblum/BusinessDen)
Deshpande and Frontera moved into a 6,700-square-foot office early last month at 1517 Blake St. in LoDo. It has about 30 employees and plans to double that number by the end of the year, according to Sara Williams, who leads human resources for the company.
Frontera signed a two-year lease and was represented by Matt Groppenbacher and Matt Harbert of JLL. Ana Sandomire of NAI Shames Makovsky represented the landlord.
Deshpande said being near Union Station is a plus, and noted that Ibotta recently signed a 10-year lease for space down the street at 16 Market Station.
“My hope is that a handful more startups open up around here,” he said. “Something like Ibotta, which went public, will mint some wealthy people. And they’ll go start companies, and they’ll invest in others. That’s the vibrancy that Denver needs. In San Francisco, they have that in spades. We need that here.”
Frontera founder Amol Deshpande stands outside the company’s new downtown Denver office. (Max Scheinblum/BusinessDen)
Amol Deshpande’s son was struggling.
At 2 years old, he was nonverbal, toe walking and wouldn’t respond to his name.
The now-13-year-old was eventually diagnosed with autism. But figuring that out was a struggle too.
“It was very hard to find somebody who had expertise in this, who could diagnose it, who could do it in a relatively expeditious manner such that we could do the early intervention that we knew was so critical,” he said. “So we were hodgepodging what we could together, trying to get a diagnosis. It was a very challenging process.”
The entrepreneur, who founded the ag-tech firm Farmers Business Network, ended up paying around $5,500 for a private diagnosis. The full report came eight weeks after the process started.
Still, the therapies paid off.
“Today, he talks better than 54% of kids,” he said. “You wouldn’t usually say, ‘Oh, your kid’s in the 54th percentile on something, and that’s the most amazing thing.’ But it’s someone who never spoke, and now they speak better than 54% of most kids.”
Many families can’t afford that cost in money or time.
So, in 2023, Deshpande founded Frontera to help clinicians diagnose more kids faster. The company recently raised $32 million, backed by coastal firms Lux Capital, Lightspeed, Bison Ventures, Menlo Ventures and Inspired Capital.
“The therapies and the interventions work, yet most of the people who need them don’t get them,” he said. “And I know that the health care system has a lot of that, but I would say in the early childhood development space and in autism, it is probably most severe when you look at the seriousness of the condition.”
Frontera uses its artificial intelligence software to assess and help diagnose children with potential developmental delays at a fraction of the price and time. Deshpande said its software can infer and draw conclusions from behaviors, much like a clinician would, and package them into complex reports.
“And what that does is it gets leverage to that clinician who has 10 times more demand than they could meet,” Deshpande said. “If we can get the report writing and other stuff down, then they can take more cases.”
The technology can also process video from therapy sessions. Clinicians can record using a phone or tablet, and Frontera will analyze everything from speech, movement and interactions with people and toys.
“For the first time ever, you can extract clinical data from video. So, you take a video of a child in therapy, and you can extract 30 frames a second of data points,” Deshpande said. “And what that means is a level of precision and data that was never before even close to possible.”
Grant Sickle, left, and Amol Deshpande during a demo of Frontera’s tech. (Max Scheinblum/BusinessDen)
“Instead of a clinician perhaps overseeing 15 clients, we want to get to a place where they can oversee 30 or 60, but not (have) any more stress on them,” said Grant Sickle, Frontera’s director of product.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, around 9% of children have a developmental disability. Deshpande said around 3% to 5% of boys are diagnosed with autism. Many of those kids could spend up to a year on wait lists to diagnose their delays.
“I actually think the problem is massively underestimated … because when you get an early intervention done with a kid, that affects the next 90 years of their life,” Desphande said.
“We have a lot of drugs under development for Alzheimer’s and dementia to extend useful life by a couple of years, but there isn’t a single drug under development for a 2-year-old who doesn’t talk,” he added. “That child will need complete care for the rest of their lives if there’s no intervention.”
Deshpande said most of the $32 million raised will go toward tech development. Though the service already operates profitably, he said bettering it requires hiring more people and upping computing power.
“There’s a long way to go to get the cost down, to continue to improve the efficacy of the technology on an accuracy basis, and build those modules we talked about,” he said. “But we’re very confident at this point that that’s where we’re headed.”
This isn’t the first health-tech venture for Deshpande.
Through his family office, Divergent Investments, he has helped finance several medical startups, including Soar Autism Center, a care facility with several locations in Colorado and Arizona, and Manatee, a Denver company that helps streamline family mental health care.
He moved to Denver in 2022 from San Francisco, citing a Bay Area “buzz” that never quite returned to its pre-pandemic levels. He also said the Mile High environment was better for his two sons, who were going into their preteen years.
“There is vibrancy in terms of the talent pools, but there’s also a lot of frivolousness and flakiness,” he said of the Bay Area, where he lived for 15 years. “People switch jobs monthly, almost, it feels like. You’re the next hot thing, or you’re not the next hot thing. I think there is a sanctity to building here that is different, and I’ve actually really enjoyed it.”
Deshpande started Farmers Business Network, the agricultural e-commerce firm, in 2014. Though he left in early 2023 before starting Frontera, he still is a shareholder. Before that, he worked for VC firm Kleiner Perkins in the Bay Area.
“I’ve been an early-stage entrepreneur almost my whole life, and FBN was an opportunity to build and grow a huge business. We were 1,000 employees when I left,” Deshpande said. “We’re ramping up here. I think (Frontera) will be bigger.”
The company uses a consumption pricing model rather than a subscription, and Deshpande said he is making it available to anyone who wants it — even potential competitors.
“If someone’s going to try to get more kids into care, get them diagnosed, we will make sure that they have access to this technology on reasonable terms,” he said.
In the future, he sees the company delving into all types of behavioral health issues. But for now, not even a month out of stealth, the company is focusing on tackling the diagnosis that sparked its founding.
“The early childhood issues tend to be in the shadows relative to issues of the brain with the elderly or other types of issues like obesity or cancer, which people are very public about,” he said. “Autism is wrought with conspiracy theories and random points of view, and it lacks precision. I think if we bring precision to it, it’ll change the game.”
Inside Frontera’s new office at 1517 Blake St. in Denver. (Max Scheinblum/BusinessDen)
Deshpande and Frontera moved into a 6,700-square-foot office early last month at 1517 Blake St. in LoDo. It has about 30 employees and plans to double that number by the end of the year, according to Sara Williams, who leads human resources for the company.
Frontera signed a two-year lease and was represented by Matt Groppenbacher and Matt Harbert of JLL. Ana Sandomire of NAI Shames Makovsky represented the landlord.
Deshpande said being near Union Station is a plus, and noted that Ibotta recently signed a 10-year lease for space down the street at 16 Market Station.
“My hope is that a handful more startups open up around here,” he said. “Something like Ibotta, which went public, will mint some wealthy people. And they’ll go start companies, and they’ll invest in others. That’s the vibrancy that Denver needs. In San Francisco, they have that in spades. We need that here.”
