Catching up with Betty Chang, founder of Trapeze.
In this alumni spotlight interview — the sixth in our series — we caught up with Betty Chang, a Luminary building a career in healthcare innovation by supporting — and now launching — fast- growing startups solving thorny healthcare challenges.
Betty Chang, founder of Trapeze
Betty joined Luminary Labs in 2018 and contributed to multiple projects across our focus areas during her tenure, developing appreciation for how innovation can tackle complex, systemic challenges. Since leaving Luminary Labs, she has helped build fast-growing startups, first as chief of staff and initial business hire at a patient engagement software company, and as a Venture Fellow at an investment firm.
Today, Betty is a founder focused on building Trapeze, a Y Combinator-backed healthcare AI startup reimagining how patients and providers connect. Currently supporting 140 healthcare providers across the Northeast, the company’s AI voice agents are working with providers to streamline patient scheduling and engagement — a first step toward solving the broader patient-provider connection challenge.
We recently sat down with Betty to hear about her founder journey, the lessons she’s carried forward from her time at Luminary Labs, and what it’s like building a technology startup in today’s rapidly evolving healthcare landscape.
What problems (or projects) did you work on at Luminary Labs?
I joined Luminary Labs in 2018 as a strategist. What drew me to the role was the diverse portfolio of projects across mission-driven sectors. I supported healthcare and education projects, including innovation challenges: Tool Foundry and CTE Mission: CubeSat.
My first project was analytical, doing market research to produce a report for the Office of Career,Technical, and Adult Education (OCTAE) at the U.S. Department of Education. The goal of the research was to recommend innovative technologies that could accelerate adult education and upskill the workforce for high-skill, high-wage, and in-demand careers. I appreciated the level of autonomy and resources I had to execute the project, conducting fast-paced research and interviews, and liaising regularly with our client to make sure their goals were incorporated.
Upskilling and reskilling the workforce is something I think about constantly today while building a company in the age of AI. I’m always asking: how can my team and I leverage new tools effectively and stay ahead of the curve?
What is something you learned at Luminary Labs that you continue to value today?
Luminary Labs was my first job where I worked on external client-facing projects and built client relationships. And it taught me what it takes to be obsessed with delivering value to our clients. There are so many tools I learned at Luminary that I still use today: from writing effective emails with a clear call to action, to asking the right questions to uncover your customer’s pains and priorities.
Today, for Trapeze, I am always asking: How can we deliver a 10-star experience to our customers and users? We sell SaaS (Software as a Service), which is very different from what I was doing as a strategist, but at Luminary Labs I realized that the customer lifecycle doesn’t just start once you’ve signed the contract. It starts with obsessing about how you deliver value through the business development lifecycle, to the delivery of excellent outcomes, to the relationships you continue to build even after the project ends.
Storytelling is also a skill that I took away from Luminary. Luminary Labs is great at storytelling. Sometimes, storytelling is traditionally thought of as marketing, but storytelling has been an essential skill in every single one of my jobs. We practice storytelling with customers when convincing them to buy a product. I use storytelling when talking with investors to convey why a company is worthy of funding. And it’s important in recruiting; I have to convince job candidates to join the rocket ship journey of a startup.
Do you have a favorite Luminary Labs memory?
It is difficult to think of just one in particular, but getting through the pandemic was a big part of my Luminary Labs experience. I remember that being a really, really tough moment when our world flipped 180 degrees overnight.
There was so much uncertainty in how our work would change, and how our client relationships would change. Going through the pandemic with my Luminary colleagues truly highlighted the strength of the culture and community.
We would host Zoom calls, not to talk about work, but to just share about our lives. Being there for one another over FaceTime, having these regular recurring Zoom lunches, when connection was so difficult in the real world, at that time was really important to me. Getting through the pandemic alongside my Luminary colleagues deepened my friendships with them — and these are friendships I still appreciate today.
What are you working on right now?
I am the founder of a healthcare AI startup called Trapeze. We are reimagining the very best way for providers and patients to connect. The specific problem we’re tackling today for our provider customers is the difficulty of managing appointments over the phone — and 90% of patients still call in to get scheduled! Providers are struggling with rising costs, difficulty staffing 24/7 coverage, and high turnover among their scheduling staff. This has big implications for the patient experience: Patients have to deal with long hold times, scheduling errors, and just not getting the care they need from providers altogether.
On the day-to-day, we’re working with more than 100 providers nationwide, staffing AI agents that act as their best schedulers. Our AI agents support their existing staff and help them streamline how they schedule and manage their patients over the phone … so people have instant access to the answers and appointments they need, at all times.
What’s the most exciting thing about your current role?
Our customers and users are the most exciting part of Trapeze. The question is always: How can we meaningfully impact the KPIs, goals, and priorities of customers? We take a wider definition of customers. They’re the doctors whose schedules we manage, the administrators who run the operations, and patients who interact with our providers.
So much of this is understanding at a deep, deep level the customer’s pains, priorities, and challenges. Being on-site, mapping out their workflows, downloading their mental model of how they view their work — it’s fascinating! Understanding how your customers think is the best way to find creative and meaningful solutions to their problems. That’s the foundation for making something people want!
We’d love to hear about an underrated issue, trend, or innovation you care about — what’s on your radar, and what do you wish more people were thinking about?
I spend a lot of time trading notes with doctors in my job on how to create a great patient experience and build patient trust. A doctor recently said to me that with AI, “the soft skills in medicine are really going to become the hard skills.” And that hit home.
With clinical AI solutions taking over diagnostics, documentation, and even treatment planning, the real competitive advantage in medicine won’t be technical. It’ll be human. The so-called “soft skills” like empathy, listening, and building patient trust will become the hardest skills to master, the most critical to “innovate” on, and the most valuable currency in healthcare.
Is there something you’ve read or seen or listened to lately that you would really want others to know about?
A reason patient access is so tough is because healthcare is a complicated system made even more complicated by all the jargon, buzzwords, and acronyms… ACO, HMO, PPO, EOB, PCP, ENT, PA, the list goes on. At Trapeze, we want to demystify healthcare — make it easy and simple to understand, and, dare I say, fun.
We’re creating social content toward this goal. Follow along with @trapezehealth on TikTok and Instagram.
Tell us about something that brings you joy.
My little sister graduated from college recently. Watching her grow up has been my biggest joy.
