💌 Issue 90: $12m for Millie's maternal healthcare | Cosette Pharma mega $430m buy | First new hormone-free copper IUD in 40 years
+ lots more in your weekly round-up of women's health innovation and Femtech News
Hello and welcome to #90 of FutureFemHealth (w/c February 24 2025).
A slightly more compact issue this week as I’ve been heads-down on some important work on the CensHERship campaign - I look forward to sharing more with you on that in the next few weeks!
🌟 Coming up today we’ve got:
🏆 $12m Series A for Millie’s maternal healthcare
📌 Cosette Pharma’s $430m buy of Mayne Pharma creates women’s health giant
💊 Reducing barriers in sex- and gender-specific research
✅ FDA approves first new hormone-free copper IUD in 40 years
But before that: Would you like to sponsor an upcoming FutureFemHealth newsletter? We’re read by nearly 8,000 professionals, founders and investors in women’s health and I’m taking bookings from March onwards. For more info and a copy of our media pack drop me a line: anna@futurefemhealth.com
💰 Funding, deals and investment news
📌 US: Millie secures $12m Series A for midwifery-led, tech-enabled maternal healthcare. Demand for midwifery-led care is growing in the US, against a backdrop of poor outcomes, high costs and OBGYN shortages. Millie combines tech for remote patient monitoring, care and a proprietary patient app, as well as in-person clinics through to home postpartum visits. This investment round will fund further expansion and was co-led by TMV and Foreground Capital with participation from Pivotal Ventures and March of Dimes Innovation Fund and current investors too. (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
📌 US/AUSTRALIA: Cosette Pharma sets sights on women’s healthcare stardom with $430m Mayne Pharma buy. A huge deal which will result in a combined Mayne-Cosette product line spanning the gamut of women’s health, including birth control options Nextstellis and Annovera, menopause meds Bijuva, Intrarosa and Imvexxy and hypoactive sexual desire disorder treatment Vyleesi.(Continue reading: Fierce Pharma)
📌 US: Riley all-in-one parenting platform announces app and raises $3m seed round. Riley’s app combines AI tech and expert insights to deliver proactive and on-demand guidance. Topics include postpartum mental health support through to parenting guidance. The round was led by True Ventures. (Continue reading: Business Wire)
📌 US: Menopause brain health platform Prickly Pear Health secures $250k pre-seed funding. Issues like brain fog due to hormonal fluctuations are estimated to millions of women currently in perimenopause and menopause. Prickly Pear Health uses AI to provide personalized insights and recommendations. This round was led by Bayless Ventures and AZ Venture Capital. (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
📌 US: Pumpspotting’s national bus tour acquired by advocacy group Chamber of Mothers. The bus tour had helped drive Pumpspotting’s feeding support community and product discovery, achieving 45,000 on the ground touchpoints in 2024 alone contributing to a 600% revenue increase for the brand. (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
📌 UK: SBRI Healthcare awards funding to 14 women’s health start-ups. The SBRI initiative provides funding to innovators tackling unmet needs faced by the NHS. In this dedicated women’s health competition, winning innovations include a perineal injury prevention device, a hormone monitor to manage migraines and an AI receptionist to drive up cervical screening appointments. £1.3m in total was awarded and the projects will now run for up to six months to demonstrate whether the innovations are technically and commercially feasible. Let’s hope we see some eventually reach the NHS! (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
🌟 Industry news from this week
📌 CANADA: Canada's My Normative launches new way to reduce barriers in sex- and gender-specific research. Innovators who do want to include and accurately represent sex and gender in scientific research often need support to do that. It can be expensive, complex and time-consuming. My Normative’s new ‘starter product’ help reduce these barriers. Plus it’s offering free funding for five projects each year for the next five years! (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
US: HerMD to close its doors? There are reports that VC-backed HerMD is to close all of its locations across the U.S next month, citing ongoing challenges in the industry. The start-up, founded in 2025 by Dr Somi Javaid, specializes in menopause support and women’s sexual health. It had raised a total of $36 million to date - with $18 million of that in 2023. It’s unclear whether HerMD will continue to operate at all following the closures. (Continue reading: Biz Journals)
📌 US: Future Family will insure IVF treatments and give you your $40,000 back after two failed cycles. IVF continues to be impossibly expensive and inaccessible for many people. After a decade of fertility financing and loans, Future Family now launches an IVF insurance product. Availability will be at participating clinics nationwide. (Continue reading: Fortune)
📌 US/GERMANY: Kaia Health partners with Vira Health to add pelvic floor therapy and menopause education to MSK program. Issues like pelvic pain, back pain and menopause-related changes don’t exist in isolation to each other. Kaia Health will integrate support into its existing musculoskeletal (MSK) expert-guided digital program. (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
📌 AUSTRALIA: HeraMED partners with Garmin Health to enhance pregnancy monitoring through wearables. Smartwatch giant Garmin increases its focus on health applications, with its data now available in HeraMED’s clinical grade remote monitoring platform HeraCare. Pregnant users will now see a broader range of health metrics such as heart rate, sleep patterns and fitness activity levels. (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
🩸 Research and women’s health news
📌 US: FDA approves first new hormone-free copper IUD in over 40 years. MIUDELLA, developed by Sebela Pharma containes half the copper of its predecessor Paragard and a smaller flexible nitonol frame. (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
📌 UK: Womb cancer blood test research ‘could save lives.’ Uterine sarcomas make up just three out of 100 cancers of the womb, but the symptoms are similar to more common, and non-cancerous, fibroid growths. Charity The Eve Appeal is funding work on a blood test that could detect the uterine sarcomas more accurately. (Continue reading: BBC)
✅ Jobs
📌 UK: Various roles in product, clinical and tech, Aneira Health
📌 US: Director, Medical Affairs, Conceptra Biosciences
📌 INDIA: Social Media Associate, Asan
That’s all for this week! See you next time. If you’ve missed any previous newsletter issues catch them all at futurefemhealth.com and do make sure to follow us on LinkedIn.
