Google's former artificial intelligence chief launches a digital health start-up

San Francisco start-up Forward is betting its hands-on--and very digital approach--to treating patients will help to carve out a niche for the new company in the emerging market for personalized and concierge-style healthcare. Founded by CEO Adrian Aoun, who previously worked as director of special projects for Google, Forward is attempting to shift the traditional healthcare model away from immediate and reactive care to proactive care through the use of technology and artificial intelligence. Google acquired Aoun's first start-up, Wavii.com, in 2014 in a $30 million deal. Wavii became the hub of Google's artificial intelligence business unit to develop more natural language and personal assistant technologies such as voice-activated search queries for the Google search engine. Now Aoun is turning his attention to digital healthcare.