Amazon-Berkshire-JPMorgan health venture picks operating chief

(Bloomberg) – Jack Stoddard, a longtime healthcare executive, has been named as chief operating officer of the new health venture being launched by Amazon.com, JPMorgan Chase and Berkshire Hathaway.

Stoddard started Tuesday, according to a statement from the still-nameless health venture. He’ll work with Atul Gawande, the Harvard surgeon and writer who was named in June to run the initiative.

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Amazon.com Inc. offices in Seattle, Washington. Photographer: Daniel Berman/Bloomberg

The leaders of the three companies have warned it will take time for the effort to meet its goal of improving care for their workers.

“We’re not in a hurry,” Berkshire Chief Executive Officer Warren Buffett said in an interview last week on Bloomberg TV. “We’d like to be in a hurry but we’re not going to try and do something faster than it can be done.”

Stoddard most recently was general manager of digital health at Comcast. He previously worked at the health technology firm Accolade Inc., and before that at UnitedHealth’s Optum unit, according to his profile on LinkedIn.

The news was reported earlier Tuesday by CNBC.

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