EOUL, South Korea — July , 2026 — HITLAB, the health innovation and technology organization, launched Breakthrough Alliance Asia at a kickoff event in Seoul, extending its flagship startup-corporate partnership program into the Asia-Pacific region for the first time.

Breakthrough Alliance bridges the gap between industry-leading healthcare companies and the promising digital health startups shaping the future of care. Startups selected into the program gain the opportunity to build strategic relationships with established industry brands, refine their core concepts and prototypes alongside practicing healthcare professionals, and design a study to rapidly verify their core innovation — all at zero cost to apply and zero equity taken by HITLAB.

The Asia chapter joins Breakthrough Alliance’s existing U.S. and Europe boards, reflecting growing demand from the region’s health tech innovators for structured pathways into global partnerships and validation.

“Asia is home to some of the fastest-moving health innovation in the world, and Breakthrough Alliance gives that innovation a real bridge to the partners who can scale it,” said Dr. Stan Kachnowski, Chair of HITLAB. “Our model has always been simple: pair promising startups with the people who can pressure-test their ideas and open doors for them. Bringing that model to Asia was the natural next step.”

“Every region we’ve brought Breakthrough Alliance to has taught us something new about how startups and corporates find each other,” said Bill Taranto, President of Merck Global Health Innovation and Chair of HITLAB Breakthrough Alliance. “Asia’s digital health ecosystem is producing remarkable ideas, and this program exists to make sure those ideas don’t stall out for lack of the right relationships. We’re looking forward to building that bridge here.”

HITLAB is currently building out the founding board for Breakthrough Alliance Asia and will announce additional leadership and founding members in the coming weeks.