Your Voice Could Predict a Heart Attack

Soon, your doctor might not need a blood test to check on your heart. They might just need to hear you speak.

A startup called Noah Labs has built an AI tool called Vox that detects worsening heart failure by analysing a patient's voice recording — submitted from a smartphone or tablet. The FDA just granted it breakthrough device designation, fast-tracking its path to US approval.

Here's how it works: heart failure causes fluid to build up in the lungs. That fluid subtly changes the acoustics of your voice in ways the human ear can't detect… but AI can. Vox picks up those changes and flags them as early warning signs, before the patient even feels worse.

Heart failure affects 6M Americans and is the leading cause of hospital admissions globally. Most current monitoring tools require implanted sensors or clinical-grade equipment — Vox just needs a voice note.

It's already been validated in five clinical trials with partners including the Mayo Clinic. The dominant method today involves a wireless sensor implanted directly into the pulmonary artery. Vox is software only. No surgery, no sensors. Just your voice.

Matthew Gallagher had $20,000, a brother, and a plan. Two months later he had a telehealth company selling GLP-1 weight-loss drugs. A year after that, $401 million in revenue and 250,000 customers.

Current run rate: $1.8 billion. Employees: still just the brother.

No investors. No team. Just Gallagher, a very supportive sibling, and reportedly every AI tool he could get his hands on — Claude, Grok, Midjourney, Runway, ElevenLabs.

The New York Times wrote a glowing story and it went viral, but here's the important part that was missing: Futurism reported over 800 fake doctor accounts on Facebook, before-and-after photos of patients that were AI-deepfaked stock images, and an FDA warning letter for misleading health claims.

The AI infrastructure became a vehicle for velocity without accountability. Don't buy such AI "success" stories — they're fraud dressed up in a tech narrative.

Celebrating this week's Woman in Tech: Meet Claire McDonough, CFO of Rivian Automotive, the electric vehicle company reshaping how the world thinks about sustainable transport and mobility.

She studied Public Policy and Visual Art at Duke University, before later earning an MBA in Finance, Accounting, and Entrepreneurial Studies from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Fun fact: Before entering the world of banking, McDonough worked as a professional pastry chef in the south of France.

In 2021, she joined Rivian as CFO. Under her leadership, Rivian executed one of the largest IPOs in US history, raising approximately $13.7 billion.