Chapter CEO Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz - medicare complexity, $100B fraud and how tech can fix it

**Auren Hoffman** (0:02)
Hello, fellow data nerds. Welcome to World of DaaS. I'm your host, Auren Hoffman, CEO of Incubate and GP of Flex Capital. Discover more episodes, get weekly data as a service news, original content, articles on data, and more at worldofdaas.com. That's worldofdaas.com.
Hello, fellow data nerds. My guest today is Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz. Cobi is the co-founder and CEO of Chapter, an AI-enabled Medicare advisory platform that builds comprehensive data and models to help seniors navigate their coverage. Chapter raised a Series D in April 2025 with the company valued over $1.5 billion. Prior to founding Chapter, Cobi worked on the US government team at Palantir. Cobi, welcome to World of DaaS.

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (0:51)
Thanks so much for having me.

**Auren Hoffman** (0:53)
I'm super excited. Now, Medicare might be the most complicated marketplace in the world, certainly that I know of. What is the core misunderstanding that people have about how the system actually works?

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (1:05)
There's so much. I think there's a few big things. One is that most people assume that Medicare is just automatic, that when you turn 65 or retire, you just get it. But that's not all what happens. You actually have to take a lot of actions. You have to sign up for original Medicare and then supplemental coverage because the government offering only covers up to 80% of expected health costs. So almost everyone gets supplemental coverage. There's a lot of decisions. And then because of the way the risk pools work, if you sign up at the wrong time or you delay signing up or you miss your window, the government imposes lifetime penalties on you.

**Auren Hoffman** (1:38)
Wait, what?

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (1:39)
Yeah. It's actually really messed up. My mom has this. So if you miss your sign up window, the government will add...

**Auren Hoffman** (1:46)
Like if you sign up at 66 instead of 65 or something?

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (1:50)
You have a few months of a window to sign up for, but if you miss that few month window, usually it's seven months, sometimes it's eight months, depending on your situation. But if you miss that few month window, then the government will start adding roughly 1% of premium every month. So if you sign up 12 months late, you'll be paying a 12% higher premium every year for the rest of your life.

**Auren Hoffman** (2:09)
What's the reasoning for that? What's the rationale? You would think it's good for the government if you sign up late, because then they don't have to cover you for that period of time, right?

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (2:16)
The policy rationale actually does make sense. It's because they need to create a risk pool, and they can't just have people waiting until they're older and sicker. So when you're 65, you're actually young for a Medicare age, and they need to get the young people and healthy people into the risk pool paying their premiums earlier. Otherwise, the whole system breaks.

**Auren Hoffman** (2:33)
Oh, okay. Because for Medicare, you still pay something even though it's covered. It's a good deal, but you still have to pay. So that money that goes in, and essentially when you're 65, they're making money off you, but by the time you're 75, they're losing money on you.

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (2:47)
Yeah, directionally, yes. Because you pay Medicare Part A, payroll taxes your entire life, so you've been contributing to the system. But there's another part of Medicare called Part B, which you have to pay for each month. And then there's all these other parts, exceedingly complicated.

**Auren Hoffman** (3:01)
Okay, interesting. But that 1% more per month, that sounds like a lot, actually. Yeah, that sounds like a pretty high, I didn't realize it was that much higher.

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (3:10)
Yeah, and it can get up there. Again, there's a reasonable rationale for it, but the government makes it so complicated and so opaque to know when you're supposed to do what, that it's actually very hard.

**Auren Hoffman** (3:21)
It's not like you just get an app reminder being like, hey, you haven't done this yet or something like a call from a friendly person.

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (3:28)
If you're a chapter member, you do. But no, if you're just a citizen and the government will mail you a 350-page book, that's called Medicare and You, that they expect people to read and then yeah, you're supposed to parse that.

**Auren Hoffman** (3:41)
Oh, wow. Okay. And what happens if you move between states? So let's say you move from Connecticut to New York or somewhere, do you have to re-sign up again or something?

**Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz** (3:50)
Yes. So the original Medicare, that first part, is federal. So you don't have to do anything there. But for the supplemental coverage, which almost everyone has and has to deal with, that is either county or state-based. So you will have to likely switch your plan at that point.