On the TechTO stage ×1
First seen on a TechTO stage in 2017. Every TechTO talk is searchable — ask the archive about Alexis ↗
In their words
The first lesson is: build a human-powered service. Even though we're a tech company, we don't offer software services.
Build a hybrid team — bring together these two very different teams, the healthcare professionals and the technologists, to solve problems together. And that's actually very hard, because they tend to speak different languages.
The result is super powerful: you get the speed of a high-tech startup in a space where you can actually get to deliver great care to real people.
Quick answers
Is Alexis Smirnov still at Dialogue?
Yes. Dialogue's own about page lists him as Co-founder & Chief Technology Officer as of July 2026, and in a January 2026 post on his Substack he wrote as a Dialogue co-founder about the company's next chapter, nearly ten years in.
What is Alexis Smirnov building now?
ServiceOS, which he describes as an operating system for health services. In a January 2026 post he wrote that the software and AI agents making up ServiceOS 'will take over much of those dreaded admin tasks, doing them faster, more consistently, resulting in a better, more delightful care experience.'
What did Smirnov say about building a health-tech company at TechTO?
In his June 2017 talk he argued that 'med tech hybrids' win when they own and control the whole technology stack, that the service is human-powered rather than software, and that healthcare users are not tolerant early adopters — you cannot ship an unfinished product. The hardest and most important part, he said, is building a hybrid team of clinicians and technologists.