Joshua Candamo PHD

"Your most valuable intellectual property
is not your patents. It is not your technology.
It is your people" - Joshua Candamo

Chief Innovation Officer, HealthPlanOne

Tampa, Florida

Tech Highlights

Joshua Candamo serves as the Chief Innovation Officer at HealthPlanOne. With the healthcare industry continually evolving, his commitment lies in responsibly and ethically leveraging Artificial Intelligence. Additionally, he strives to enhance the utilization of cutting-edge information systems and technologies, streamlining operations, and driving transformative outcomes for individuals seeking the most suitable healthcare solutions for their needs.

In his previous role, he held the position of Chief Information Officer (CIO) at Ensurem, where he oversaw the development of the next generation of insurance technology, direct-to-consumer products, and call center innovation. He joined Ensurem in 2019, helping it become one of the fastest-growing privately held companies in the entire Tampa Bay area (Ranked #1 in 2020 and #5 in 2021 by the Tampa Bay Business Journal) and its sale to the private equity group 777 Partners in 2021 after surpassing $40 million in revenue. In 2021, he received the prestigious Tampa Bay Business Journal's CIO of the Year Award for his work at Ensurem. Under his leadership, the company overhauled and scaled the entire technology organization from a small startup to an enterprise level operation. He led the company to reach major milestones such as creating the underlying technology for the first-of-its-kind $100M credit facility backed by real-time, policy-level financial information for Medicare policies, and leveraging Artificial Intelligence (AI) to provide exceptional customer service, retention and best-in-class compliance while driving rapid growth.

His career in software development spans over 20 years, including multiple roles in technology leadership, entrepreneurship, consulting, and both back-end and front-end development. Prior to joining Ensurem in 2019, he was the Director of Development at Accusoft, a 25+ year-old company that creates document and imaging tools for developers. He focused on streamlining software development across Accusoft's largest division, starting the journey to leverage AI for automated invoice recognition, and streamlining product releases (including a 75% release time reduction for the most important product); all while increasing employee satisfaction by 177% with the implementation of a compressed week schedule with no loss of productivity. He was also the President at K9 Bytes Software, a leading provider of technology for the pet care industry. At K9 Bytes, he helped the industry modernize intake practices with many technology innovations, such as the first-in-the-industry self-serving kiosk for boarding kennel facilities, and the first mobile device application for routine medication and diet servicing. The K9 Koordinator, K9 Bytes' flagship product, known for its intuitive and easy to use interface, was the top choice for pet care management software in many countries around the world. In 2011, he led the company to a successful exit with the acquisition from Epazz, Inc.

Joshua Candamo holds a Ph.D. degree in Computer Science from the University of South Florida, specializing in different areas of AI such as pattern recognition and image processing. In addition to his Ph.D. dissertation, he published 6 first-authored, peer-reviewed publications from his research and development work in several prestigious International journals and conferences in the area of pattern recognition and Unmanned Aerial Vehicle navigation.