💌 Issue 69: Evie ring relaunch | Oura acquisition | Maven funding | Apricity Fertility egg sharing

+ lots more in your weekly round-up of FemTech and women's health innovation news

Sep 18, 2024

Hi! Welcome to issue #69 of FutureFemHealth, here to bring you your weekly news about women’s health innovation and FemTech (w/c 16 September 2024).

It’s a big week in my household as my four-year-old son started school and we begin the adjustment to the new routines, new surroundings and new adventures. Wish us luck!

🌟 Coming up today we’ve got:

💍 Evie ring relaunches - as Oura ring goes in for metabolic health
💰 Maven seeking £100m in fresh capital?
🥚Apricity Fertility introduces egg sharing programme
📉 New Report exposes health inequalities faced by women in the North of England

Got news to share from the world of FemTech and women’s health innovation? Let me know at anna@futurefemhealth.com

This week’s sponsor

Thanks to our newsletter partner for this month: Palteq Ltd, a marketing agency delivering rising ROAS for femtech founders and women’s health innovators.

Founder Monica Cutler shares with us a guest article this week too, all about advertising in women’s health - find it further down under the resources section below.

💍 Evie ring relaunches - as Oura ring goes for metabolic health

Evie ring, the first dedicated smart ring specifically for women is finally back on sale.

First announced in 2022 , the Evie Ring was long anticipated ahead of its original launch early in 2024. But despite securing $1million in advance sales in its Black Friday pre-order sales alone, it was quickly and temporarily discontinued after negative customer feedback and lukewarm expert reviews.

Now the Evie ring is back - promising an updated app, deeper insights and a trend analysis feature which it says ‘sets Evie apart from every other wearable on the market.’ It will offer possible causes, impacts and solutions across areas such as menstrual health, heart health, sleep, mood and energy.

Competitor Oura meanwhile - though not specifically a smart ring exclusively for women - has edged closer to making female health its core. In June it proudly proclaimed its user base is now majority women. Oura has also added a raft of women’s health-focused features in recent years: Period prediction, cycle insights, pregnancy insights and integrations with platforms including Clue, Flow, Glow and Natural Cycles.

Now Oura has expanded further, in the last week announcing that it’s entering the metabolic health space. To do that, Oura has acquired Finnish start-up Veri and it will offer members the chance to wear continuous glucose monitors (CGM) to better understand how food impacts health.

The direction of travel here is about building a preventative health ecosystem, where women have all the insights they need to understand, manage and optimise their health and wellness holistically and intentionally.

And I can’t help but contrast that with another story I cover in this week’s newsletter: where a new report by Health Equity North that has found women in the North live significantly shorter and less healthier lives than the national average.

In this case, the health inequality is inextricably linked with lower earnings, fewer educational qualifications, worse mental health and more.

So as smart rings and other consumer tech supports better health for those who can afford it, unless policy makers step in for the vast majority of the public who can’t - we’ll likely only see health inequalities widen.

(Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)

💰 Funding, deals and investment news

📌 US: Maven set for new $100m+ funding round. Business Insider reports that women’s health unicorn Maven Clinic is targeting fresh capital, with a round being led by StepStone Group. Under the round, Maven is being valued at $1.7b according to sources - up from a previous $1.3b valuation back in 2022 when it raised its $90m Series E. Maven previously became the first US ‘unicorn’ dedicated to women’s health back in 2021. (Continue reading: Business Insider (paywall))

📌 FINLAND: Oura acquires metabolic health company Veri. As we trailed in our intro story, after a recent focus on women’s health, smart ring maker Oura has set its sights on metabolic health - amidst surging public interest in its importance to overall health and wellbeing. Oura itself reports that 97% of its members want to understand how foods impact health and 53% are interested in wearing a continuous glucose monitor (CGM). To bring these plans to fruition, Oura has announced that it has acquired Finnish personalised metabolic health company Veri. (Continue reading: Fitt Insider, plus this long read on the Oura blog is an excellent deep dive on its interest in metabolic health)

📌 INDIA: Healthcare platform and clinic network Newmi Care raises $1.5million. Founded in 2022, Newmi Care offers consultations, diagnostics, procedures, medications and health tracking through a single interface. It’s already served 60,000 women across more than 400 cities in India and operates 10 clinics in Delhi. This seed funding round, led by Sprout Venture Parnters, will help to add more clinics and advance tech. (Continue reading: Entrepreneur India)

🌟 More news from this week

pregnant woman standing near green plants — Photo by Ryan Franco on Unsplash

📌 UK: Apricity Fertility introduces egg sharing programme. IVF can be expensive - and that can be a barrier for many people. Apricity’s new egg sharing programme makes the process more affordable, with prices starting at just £250 - while also offering another family the chance to start the journey to parenthood too. (Continue reading: Apricity)

📌 UK: Daye partners with IVFN to enhance fertility support. Daye’s diagnostic tampon detects STI and vaginal microbiome imbalance - both of which can contribute to infertility. Now the start-up is partnering with a leading UK fertility community, the IVF Network (IVFN), which will offer expert education resources and a community too. Daye hopes the partnership will help extend its reach and impact through tools and knowledge to guide more informed decision-making about reproductive health. (Continue reading: Daye)

📌 UK: Vira Health partners with Kaia Health to improve menopause care. There’s been a recent increase in acknowledgement for the musculoskeletal impacts of menopause - with an estimated 71% of individuals going through menopause experiencing joint and muscle pain. Vira Health’s virtual menopause clinic Stella will now partner with Kaia health, a global leader in digital musculoskeletal care to help transform care for back, joint and chronic pain. It follows a similar partnership between Hinge Health and Midi Health announced earlier this month. (Continue reading: Stella for menopause)

🌟 Latest resources

two person standing on gray tile paving — Photo by Ian Schneider on Unsplash

📌 Advertising in women’s health: balancing innovation and ethics. Does marketing your FemTech or women’s health start-up feel like a double-edged sword? You want to get your message out there, but you also feel like in women’s health marketing there’s a lot of unethical and misleading ads out there and you don’t want to be associated with that. In this guest article, Palteq Ltd founder Monica Cutler shares how to navigate the marketing landscape in FemTech and women’s health. **(Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)

🩸 Research and women’s health news

📌 US: Eight takeaways from the 2024 Menopause Society Meeting. Hair loss, cognitive behavioural therapy, brain health and more were on the agenda at last week’s Menopause Society meeting in Chicago, as experts met to share the latest science and research. Dr Jen Gunter shares her key takeaways from the conference. (Continue reading: The Vajenda)

📌 Pregnancy changes the brain more than previously known, study finds. Only a few regions of the brain remain untouched by the transition to motherhood. That’s according to a new study published this week in the journal Nature Neuroscience. While the impact of these changes isn’t precisely known, one theory is that some changes make the brain more efficient. And some of these changes will remain for up to two years postpartum, while others revert within two months. Study authors now hope to replicate these findings, which were from one woman (a Dr Elizabeth R Chrastil who actually conceived the idea for the project too!). (Continue reading: CNN

📄 Govt & policy news

female doctor standing near woman patient doing breast cancer screening — Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

📌 US: Advocates and researchers herald federal breast density notification law. About half of women over 40 have dense breast tissue, which can put them at a higher risk of breast cancer and make it more difficult to spot cancer on a mammogram. Now a federal mandate means every healthcare provider must notify a woman if she has dense breast tissue, enabling her to then get the right guidance on what to do. (Continue reading: CNN)

📌 UK: Report exposes vast inequalities faced by women in the North of England. Policy interventions including a national health inequalities strategy are needed to reduce the unequal health challenges faced by women living in the North of England. A new report by Health Equity North found that women in the North live shorter lives and up to four years less good health than the national average. (Continue reading: University of York)

📌 US: Meeting the Medicaid moment. This September applications will close for a new Medicaid pilot that will give funding to 15 states for maternal health. It’s a first-of-its-kind experiment that will run for a decade and could be applied to the rest of the country if successful. With the US in the grips of a maternal health crisis, and 40% of all births in the country covered by Medicaid, this is an important and promising program. Maven Clinic’s Neel Shah takes a deep dive into its significance. (Continue reading: Maven Preprint)

📌 CANADA: BC pharmacare deal will cover hormone therapy. Around 40,000 women are set to benefit as British Columbia becomes the first province in Canada to sign a pharmacare agreement with the federal government to help the province fund hormone replacement therapy and diabetes expenses. The hormone therapy contribution is estimated to be worth between $30-$40m and will benefit 40,000 women. (Continue reading: CBC)

✅ Jobs

📌 CANADA: Director of Retention and Loyalty, Knix

📌 UK: Senior Scientist, Cell Engineering, OvartiX

📌 UK: Head of Engineering, Fertifa

Thanks for reading and see you next time! If you’ve missed any issues catch them all at futurefemhealth.com

Anna

Before you go: Would you like to support FutureFemHealth through sponsorship and get your brand in front of 1,500+ professionals, founders and investors in women’s health? I’m taking bookings from October onwards. For more info and a copy of our media pack drop me a line: anna@futurefemhealth.com