Asher Hasan was born and schooled in the UK but spent many of his formative years in Pakistan. Relocating from the UK to South Asia, he grew acutely aware of how Pakistan's low-income population lacked access to quality healthcare and socioeconomic opportunities. He pivoted away from a career as a surgeon to focus on tackling the entrenched inequities in South Asia’s health systems. In 2007, Asher founded NAYA JEEVAN ('new life'), a health insurance and wellness plan for informal and formal workers in corporate value chains which has since scaled to profitability. This insurtech impact venture was followed in 2015 with the launch of doctHERs, a digital health venture that matches the under-utilised capacity of female doctors (who would otherwise be excluded from the global health workforce) to the unmet needs of health seekers.