Innovation Lives on the Fringes: What the 2025 Global Pet Expo Teaches Us About Scaling Through Adjacent Industries
Source: Jeff Mard
The 2025 Global Pet Expo was a masterclass in how innovation often emerges not from the center, but from the edges.
In a space dominated by traditional players, it was a rising company named Veterinary Exam Assistant (VEA) that captured headlines and hearts. As the unanimous Grand Prize Winner of the 2025 Pet Care Innovation Prize, sponsored by Purina, VEA exemplifies a bold, often-overlooked thesis: the future of pet care will be shaped by ideas borrowed from outside of it. But they are not alone.
Scaling Through Adjacent, Non-Endemic Business Models
The winners of tomorrow will embrace a simple belief: animal health doesn't have to invent everything from scratch. It can and should adapt proven strategies from parallel industries. Whether it’s automation tools from logistics, AI decision-support systems from human healthcare, or consumer experience models from retail, the winners are weaving external innovation into the internal fabric of veterinary care.
“We’re not building tech for tech’s sake,” says Patricia Porter, Founder & CEO of VEA. “We’re building systems that think with the clinician — not for them.”
And that clarity of mission is paying off. In the case of VEA, Clinics using AI-powered workflow tools are saving, on average, 25 minutes per exam, allowing them to treat up to 14 additional patients daily. From real-time data retrieval to smart, nutrition-integrated treatment plans, consumers crave a modern care solution. One that (often) pulls inspiration drawn directly from human medicine, not pet-specific playbooks.
This is the same playbook many of my startups follow, from Sylvester.AI adopting an 'ingredient brand' model like Intel, to Bakeful reinventing baked goods with better-for-you donuts and muffins.
Now VEA is doing it too, bringing best-in-class data practices from human health into animal health. It’s obvious to me. Like other great founders, Patricia saw a gap and said, 'If no one’s doing it, I will.' And so far, so good
Source: VEA
Why Purina Picked VEA: A Win Rooted in Practicality
Standing out among hundreds of entries, VEA’s win at the 2025 Pet Care Innovation Prize signals something bigger than recognition, it signals alignment.
Purina’s support is no accident. Nutrition has always been a key pillar of whole-patient care, and their platform embeds it directly into clinical decision-making. Their smart treatment plan builder doesn’t treat food as an afterthought. The solution recommends evidence-based diets tailored to diagnostics, medications, and ongoing care.
“VEA is exactly the kind of solution we need at this moment,” said Dr. Nations, DVM, founder of AscendVets. “It doesn’t just use AI, it applies it to real bottlenecks clinics face every day.”
For example, the below visual illustrates how the scribing process within a clinic can be enhanced through voice technology and AI. Streamlining + enhancing the data collection process at a clinic. Empowering clinics to care for more patients.
Source: VEA
Innovation, Adapted Across Species
Like many startups I advise, VEA’s origin story is as heartwarming as it is telling. It began with Taki, a rescue woofer with no medical records and complicated health needs. The tools available felt like relics, slow and disconnected. And for someone who had helped build early AI platforms for IBM Watson, Google, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and oncology networks, it was a wake-up call.
Bringing AI to veterinary medicine, however, proved uniquely difficult. Unlike human health data, veterinary records are often handwritten, riddled with shorthand, and lack consistency across clinics. Diagnosis codes are messy. Practice styles vary wildly. And labeled training data? Almost nonexistent.
To tackle these challenges, the business grounded its engine in American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) clinical guidelines, collaborated with specialists across domains, and built flexibility into its algorithms to reflect the true diversity of how veterinary teams operate.
The result? A system that works with the grain of real-world veterinary care, not against it.
The Real Takeaway from the Global Pet Expo: Look to the Edges
If this year’s Global Pet Expo taught us anything, it’s that the next great wave of innovation won’t come from inside the echo chamber, it will come from the fringes. The crossovers. The quiet intersections between disciplines. I’m excited for what the future holds in a space.
Jeremy Baker, Chief Growth Officer of the American Pet Products Association (APPA) had this to say: “At APPA, we’re committed to gathering, informing, and connecting the broader pet care community—ensuring every voice, from legacy leaders to emerging innovators, is heard. We will continue to champion innovation by supporting the startup organizations reimagining the future of pet care."
From supply chain optimization tools to human diagnostic AI, from retail UX to subscription healthcare models, the pet care industry is ripe for cross-pollination.
