Company helps organizations in complex industries operate more efficiently and scale faster by combining Agentic AI with compliance-first vertical integrations

DANIA BEACH, Fla., Sept. 22, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Aqurio (pronounced uh-cure-rio), an Agentic AI company built for healthcare and other high-stakes industries, has been named as a finalist by The 2026 A.I. Awards in the AI Startup of the Year category.

In healthcare, Aqurio helps organizations improve workflow operations and expand capacity by putting AI to work across the patient journey, from scheduling appointments and communicating with patients to recovering outstanding balances and supporting post-procedure follow-up. Its agents carry out these workflows within existing systems, helping teams reduce administrative burden while maintaining human oversight. This approach is delivering measurable results across patient access and revenue recovery, with one organization reporting reduced scheduling time from 15 minutes to five minutes.

The Aqurio platform is HIPAA-native, HITRUST, SOC 2 Type II, PCI DSS, and ISO/IEC 42001 certified — a standard specifically designed for AI management systems — and aligned with the NIST AI Risk Management Framework. With ecosystem compatibility across 70+ electronic health record, practice management, and other source systems, organizations can deploy intelligent agents directly within existing workflows.

“Being named a finalist for AI Startup of the Year just months after launching Aqurio is a meaningful milestone for our team,” said Frank Fawzi, CEO of Aqurio. “Organizations across healthcare and other high-stakes industries are moving with urgency to modernize operations, expand capacity, and meet rising demand. We believe trusted AI will be one of the defining technologies of that transition, and Aqurio is uniquely positioned at the intersection of that need and that opportunity.”

Operated by global cloud computing awards body, The Cloud Awards, The A.I. Awards celebrates international leaders driving the next generation of artificial intelligence and machine learning. Now in its third year, the 2026 program saw entries from organizations worldwide, spanning established technology powerhouses to disruptive startups across North America, Europe, the Middle East, and APAC.

The awards highlight transformative advances across the entire AI ecosystem: from core infrastructure and governance to cutting-edge agentic workflows and AI assistants. Special emphasis is placed on practical implementations that deliver measurable value within dedicated operational units and specific vertical markets.

CEO of The Cloud Awards, James Williams, said: “Unveiling the finalists for the 2026 A.I. Awards is a significant moment. With the sheer volume of entry submissions this year, the competition is fierce, and the quality of work on display is extraordinary. We look for genuine real-world execution that turns technological promise into tangible outcomes. Aqurio and their fellow finalists have exemplified this. Making it to the finals is a remarkable achievement, and we wish everyone the very best as our panel selects the ultimate category winners.”

The program will now begin its final round of judging, where The Cloud Awards judges will select a winner in each category. A.I. Awards winners will be revealed on October 13.

The program will return to welcome new submissions for 2027, to continue recognizing excellence in artificial intelligence solutions and platforms.

To view the full list of finalists, please visit: https://www.cloud-awards.com/ai-awards/2026-finalists 

About the Cloud Awards
The Cloud Awards is an international program which has been recognizing and honoring industry leaders, innovators and organizational transformation in cloud computing since 2011. The Cloud Awards comprises five awards programs, each uniquely celebrating success across cloud computing, software-as-a-service (SaaS), cloud security, artificial intelligence (AI), and financial technologies (FinTech).

Winners are selected by a judging panel of international industry experts. For more information about the Cloud Awards, please visit https://www.cloud-awards.com/.

About Aqurio

Aqurio, pronounced uh-cure-rio, is an Agentic AI company, built to solve the challenges healthcare and high-stakes industries face. Aqurio’s AI agents power the full customer and patient lifecycle: SmartAnalytics delivering real-time visibility into 100% of interactions; SmartAgent answering every inbound call across voice, SMS, MMS, and digital, and SmartEngage orchestrating every outbound campaign. For clinical follow-up, SmartCare, part of the SmartAgent suite, handles visit summaries, post-surgical assessment, and symptom flagging. Trusted by 75+ enterprise organizations across DSO, healthcare, and more, Aqurio delivers ROI in under 90 days. Aqurio maintains a comprehensive security and compliance framework, including HIPAA-aligned controls, HITRUST r2 certification, SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001, HITECH alignment, PCI DSS, CCPA, and GDPR compliance. Learn more at aqurio.com.

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