Healthtech Talks @ Google: A Multi-Year Community Programme for Google Cloud
Solution
Google Cloud is the cloud division of one of the world's largest technology companies, with a strategically important UK healthtech and biotech customer base. Reaching those customers through advertising is straightforward; building genuine trust with the founders, clinicians and investors who shape the sector is harder. Google Cloud needed a credible, ongoing community programme that would put the brand in the room with those decision-makers, in a setting they would actually want to attend.
SomX has been running that programme for Google Cloud since the series re-launched after the pandemic, when Google Cloud approached SomX directly to bring its pre-COVID Healthtech Talks format inside Google's London offices. What started as a single re-launch has grown into a defining property in the UK healthtech calendar.
A flagship event series, designed end to end
SomX builds the programme around Google Cloud's commercial goals: deepen relationships with the UK healthtech and biotech ecosystem, raise awareness of Google Cloud's healthcare services, and own the conversations that matter to founders, investors and clinicians. Every edition is shaped to land that brief.
We curate the agenda, source and brief speakers, manage every operational layer of the night, and produce content that extends the conversation beyond the room. Dr James Somauroo, SomX's co-founder and CEO, hosts each edition, interviewing senior healthtech founders and operators on stage.
A bi-monthly cadence at Google's London offices
The series runs at Google's London venues, including Central Saint Giles, Belgrave House and Kings Cross, on a bi-monthly cadence. Each event regularly sees 500+ registrations against capacities of 150-250, and tickets routinely sell out within 24 hours of going live. Standing-room-only is the norm for the flagship editions.
The audience is deliberately broad and senior: medical students, clinicians, founders, entrepreneurs, technical leads, policymakers, pharma executives, investors and Google Cloud's own customer base, attending alongside the people they want to meet.
Special editions and formats
The format flexes. Alongside the standard talks-plus-networking evenings, SomX has produced special editions including the SomX and Google Cloud Healthtech Talks Christmas Party at Google's Kings Cross office, and themed nights that have put patient and carer voices on stage alongside founders and investors. Each special edition is designed to keep the series feeling fresh while protecting the core community feel.
A community Google Cloud's BD team can actually convert
The commercial proof point is simple: Google Cloud's business development team follows up with attendees after each event. That conversion from room to pipeline is what differentiates a community series with a commercial purpose from a corporate networking night.
Results
- A flagship, recurring property: SomX Healthtech Talks @ Google has run as a bi-monthly series across multiple Google London venues since the post-pandemic re-launch, now a recognised fixture in the UK healthtech calendar.
- Sell-out demand, every time: consistent sell-outs within 24 hours, with 500+ registrations per event against capacities of 150-250, and standing-room-only crowds for flagship editions.
- Genuine ecosystem reach: an audience drawn from across the NHS, clinical leadership, healthtech and biotech founders, investors, pharma, policy and Google Cloud's own customer base.
- Pipeline impact, not just brand reach: Google Cloud's business development team converts attendee relationships into customer conversations following each event.
- A multi-year retained partnership: SomX has produced the series for Google Cloud for multiple years, with the format and audience growing each year.
- Format that flexes: standard talks-plus-networking evenings, themed editions including patient and carer voices, and special-occasion events including the Google Cloud Healthtech Talks Christmas Party at Kings Cross.
Reflection
The Google Cloud relationship runs deeper than a single event. It is a sustained, branded community programme that puts a major enterprise customer in genuine conversation with the founders, clinicians and investors who shape its market. Years on from the post-pandemic re-launch, SomX Healthtech Talks @ Google still sells out within a day, still draws the most senior audience in UK healthtech, and still feeds Google Cloud's commercial pipeline. The proof of the partnership is that it keeps growing.
