GoKawiilZocdoc CEO Oliver Kharraz explains why Walmart Health and IBM Watson Health failed
In a Fortune commentary, Zocdoc founder and CEO Oliver Kharraz argues that Walmart's shuttered clinic network and IBM's sold-off Watson Health division both collapsed because they treated healthcare as a technology problem rather than a tangle of misaligned incentives and regulations. Walmart closed 51 clinics and its virtual care unit in 2024 after reimbursement and cost pressures made the business unsustainable, while IBM sold most of Watson Health in 2022 after sinking roughly $4 billion into it.
GoKawiil's interpretation of the reporting above, not reported fact.
Kharraz's critique highlights a recurring pattern of well-funded outsiders underestimating healthcare's structural complexity, from insurance reimbursement to regulatory friction, rather than simple technological gaps. His perspective carries weight given Zocdoc's own decade-plus survival and $2.3 billion valuation in the same industry that toppled retail and tech giants.
- Walmart closed 51 health clinics and ended virtual care in 2024 after unprofitable insurance economics.
- IBM sold most of Watson Health in 2022 after spending about $4 billion, for roughly $1 billion.
- Zocdoc's Kharraz says healthcare's core problem is systemic incentives, not lack of technology.
Source: entrepreneur.com — Sherin Shibu, 2026-09-18
Published there as: “This Doctor Runs a $2.3 Billion Health Startup. He Says This Is Why Walmart and IBM Couldn’t Crack Healthcare.”
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