Planbase, a Y Combinator Summer 2024 startup, has raised $2.1 million in pre-seed funding to transform how healthcare organizations manage their workforce. The round included participation from Y Combinator, LocalGlobe, and prominent angel investors, marking a major step toward building the next generation of AI-driven workforce management for hospitals, clinics, and care networks.

Building AI Workforce Infrastructure for Healthcare

Founded by Joe Shearman and Jack, Planbase is developing a powerful AI-based workforce management platform built specifically for the healthcare industry. The platform integrates everything from onboarding and scheduling to payroll and compliance, allowing healthcare providers to automate repetitive administrative work that traditionally drains both time and resources.

Healthcare organizations  - from small clinics to large hospital systems  - struggle with staffing inefficiencies, regulatory hurdles, and unpredictable patient loads. Planbase’s technology uses AI to predict workforce demand, fill shifts, and even validate professional credentials automatically, saving medical teams hours of manual coordination.

By unifying staffing, scheduling, and compliance in one intelligent system, Planbase enables providers to focus on what truly matters: delivering better patient care.

The Healthcare Workforce Crisis

The healthcare sector is facing one of the most severe workforce shortages in modern history. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the global shortfall of healthcare workers is projected to exceed 10 million by 2030. In the United States alone, the Bureau of Labor Statistics forecasts that more than 500,000 nurses will need to be replaced by 2027, and nearly one-third of physicians are expected to retire within the next decade.

The consequences of this shortage are immense: overworked staff, rising burnout rates, and growing inefficiencies that directly impact patient outcomes.

The healthcare workforce management software market, valued at $2.4 billion in 2024, is expected to reach $5.9 billion by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 12.2%. This surge reflects an urgent shift toward technology solutions that can automate time-consuming workforce operations and ensure compliance amid complex staffing laws.

Planbase enters the market at precisely the right time  - when hospitals are no longer looking for “HR software,” but for operational intelligence platforms that can learn, adapt, and manage the entire staffing ecosystem autonomously.

Why Planbase Matters Now

Traditional workforce management tools were never designed for healthcare. They treat staff like interchangeable resources  - but in medicine, every role, certification, and schedule has life-or-death consequences. Planbase understands this nuance.

Its AI models are built with healthcare context in mind, accounting for credential dependencies, patient acuity, legal requirements, and union agreements. Instead of generic scheduling automation, the platform acts as a decision assistant  - continuously analyzing patient demand, availability, and skills to ensure the right staff are in the right place at the right time.

The result: higher utilization rates, reduced overtime costs, and improved staff retention.

But what truly sets Planbase apart is how it embodies a shift in startup thinking  - one that every founder should take note of.

The founders didn’t build software for the healthcare industry as it exists today. They built for the healthcare system that’s inevitably coming  - one where data, compliance, and workforce allocation must move at machine speed.

And that’s the kind of foresight that defines category leaders.

The startups that dominate the next decade won’t just automate manual tasks; they’ll architect intelligence into operational infrastructure. Planbase isn’t selling convenience  - it’s selling clarity. By translating workforce chaos into clean, actionable data, it gives organizations something that’s become scarce in healthcare: predictability.

This is where founders can draw a crucial lesson  - the greatest value in automation isn’t speed, it’s certainty. The companies that win aren’t those that do things faster, but those that help industries make smarter decisions without friction.

Planbase quietly builds on that truth. It doesn’t compete to replace human managers; it empowers them with the kind of insight that scales their judgment across an entire organization.

In a world obsessed with disruption, Planbase chose something smarter  - reinforcement. Instead of tearing down existing systems, it strengthens them with intelligence.

That’s how defensibility is built: not by replacing people, but by becoming indispensable to their decision-making.

Backed by Leading Investors

Y Combinator, one of the world’s most influential startup accelerators, brings deep expertise in scaling data and automation startups globally. LocalGlobe, a UK-based venture firm known for its early bets on transformative tech platforms, adds strategic weight and international reach.

Together, these backers provide Planbase not just with capital, but with an ecosystem of advisors and partners ready to accelerate adoption across healthcare networks.

The Market Outlook: Automation in Care Operations

Healthcare operations technology is rapidly evolving from back-office tools into mission-critical systems. According to industry forecasts, AI adoption in healthcare administration is expected to exceed 70% by 2028, as providers face increasing cost pressure and labor shortages.

The global healthcare AI market, currently valued at $19.2 billion, is projected to surpass $150 billion by 2032, growing at a staggering CAGR of 28%. Within that, workforce automation represents one of the fastest-growing subsegments  - driven by hospitals’ need to balance patient demand with limited human resources.

Planbase’s technology directly addresses this intersection  - using predictive intelligence to match medical professionals with shifting workloads in real time, while ensuring that every staffing decision complies with safety and licensing regulations.

The company’s ability to automate onboarding, credentialing, scheduling, and payroll creates a continuous data loop  - one where every shift, task, and role feeds back into smarter future planning.

The Founders’ Vision

Joe Shearman and Jack founded Planbase with a shared vision to remove the administrative weight that’s crippling the healthcare workforce. Both bring backgrounds in healthtech operations and AI product design, giving them the ability to bridge clinical understanding with technical precision.

Their long-term goal is ambitious: to make Planbase the operating system for healthcare workforce intelligence, powering everything from staffing forecasts to automated compliance.

What’s Next for Planbase

With its $2.1 million raise, Planbase plans to expand its product and data science teams, enhance integrations with major healthcare systems, and launch pilot programs with hospitals across North America.

The company’s roadmap focuses on advancing its AI scheduling engine, enabling institutions to predict demand fluctuations weeks in advance and automatically assign the right professionals with minimal human intervention.

As healthcare faces the dual challenge of rising demand and shrinking staff, Planbase isn’t just optimizing workflows  - it’s helping rebuild trust, stability, and sustainability within one of society’s most vital systems.

Because in the end, technology’s highest purpose in healthcare isn’t to replace humans  - it’s to give them back the time and clarity to care.