Proprio’s Physical AI at the 2025 JPM Healthcare Conference

At CES this week, Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, highlighted Physical AI as the next frontier in the AI revolution. While much of his focus was on autonomous driving and general-purpose robotics — showcasing DCVC portfolio company Agility Robotics and their ground­breaking humanoid robot, Digit — other critical appli­ca­tions of Physical AI are emerging.

One of the most trans­for­ma­tive areas is healthcare, partic­u­larly surgery. In this field, in silico tools, including computer vision and machine learning, are mastering tasks tradi­tion­ally performed by highly skilled surgeons. AI Transformer archi­tec­tures are training computing systems to support complex surgical procedures. At DCVC, we refer to this branch of Physical AI as Somatic AI because of its direct application to the human body.

Our portfolio company Proprio, a leader in the TechMed movement, will showcase its AI-powered navigation, guidance, and record-keeping tech­nolo­gies next week at the JPM Healthcare Conference. Proprio’s system uses an advanced array of AI-managed sensors to guide intricate spinal procedures. Following FDA clearance and successful live surgeries at the end of last year, Proprio has rapidly expanded its reach, consis­tently delivering exceptional clinical outcomes for world-class spine surgeons.

Healthcare is projected to represent 20% of the U.S. GDP by 2025, making it larger than manu­fac­turing, tech, retail, and energy. Harnessing AI to enhance clinical outcomes and improve access to care is poised to become one of the most impactful appli­ca­tions of Physical AI in the coming decade.