💌 Issue 103: Meet the new women's health VC fund | WellTheory secures $5m for autoimmune care | AOA Dx accelerates ovarian cancer diagnostic | Heavy periods affect education
+ lots more in your weekly round-up of women's health innovation and FemTech news
Hi! Welcome to issue #103 of FutureFemHealth (w/c May 26 2025).
🌟 Coming up today we’ve got:
💰 The new VC fund investing $25 million in early-stage women’s health.
📈 Autoimmune care start-up WellTheory secures $5 million to scale with AI.
❤️ AOA Dx accelerates ovarian cancer diagnostic test with strategic partnership.
🩸 Heavy periods affect school attendance and exam scores, study in England finds.
Got news to share with our 8,000 global readers who are working in women’s health and FemTech? Or would you like to sponsor the newsletter and reach our audience? Reply to this email or let me know at anna@futurefemhealth.com
💰“We’re backing zebras, not chasing unicorns”
VC fund Fern Capital launches with $25m for women’s health
A new venture capital firm has announced a $25 million early-stage fund which will be focused on women’s health startups across the UK, Europe and Africa. (Read our full story here)
Fern Capital, co-founded by seasoned leaders Dr Afua Basoah and Dr Abigail Osei-Kumi, will back clinically validated, technology-driven solutions for health conditions that disproportionately, differently, or exclusively affect women.
“At Fern Capital, we see investing in women’s health not as a niche, but as a generational opportunity to back visionary founders building enduring companies that improve lives at scale” said Dr Osei-Kumi.
Fern’s debut vehicle, Dignity Fund I, will invest between $250,000 and $1 million of seed capital per company helping dozens of start-ups to get the boost they so need to get their innovations off the ground.
And while the fund is still in the process of closing, its first investment has already been made in Impli, a UK-based startup founded by Anna Luisa Schaffgotsch, developing a real-time hormone monitoring device for use during IVF.
Billion-dollar outcomes - not billion-dollar valuations
Fern Capital’s approach also departs from the high-growth-at-all-costs model that still dominates venture capital. Instead, the firm favours resilient, impact-driven businesses with sustainable revenue and long-term health outcomes at their core.
“We’re not chasing unicorns - we’re backing zebras: companies that are grounded, resilient, and focused on real-world impact,” Dr Osei-Kumi told me.
“For us, it’s not just about billion-dollar valuations - it’s about billion-dollar outcomes in the form of healthier women, stronger communities, and sustainable businesses.”
💰 Funding, deals and investment news
📌 U.S: WellTheory secures $5 million to launch AI-led autoimmune care platform. Autoimmune conditions affect an estimated 50 million Americans - most of them women. Over the past year WellTheory’s virtual care model has grown revenue 225% YoY, delivered over $10K in average employer savings per patient, and secured early enterprise partnerships. Now, with a proven model, the company is scaling — building AI infrastructure including proprietary tools Care Hub and Care Scribe. This $5M round includes backing from Samsung Ventures, Opal Ventures, and Up2. (Continue reading: FutureFemHealth)
📌 UK: Hormona, a HealthTech startup enabling women to track, understand and optimise their hormones, raises €7.8 million. Hormona already offers a cycle tracking app and has spent the last four years developing the “first fully quantitative hormone tests of their kind“, covering the full clinical range. With over 90% accuracy compared to traditional venous blood sampling, Hormona wants to pioneer a new, much more accessible way to track hormonal health. The soon-to-be-released at-home test is a key part of that vision. This round was led by Voima Ventures (Helsinki) and co-led by SuperNode Global VC (London). (Continue reading: Eu-startups)
📌 SWITZERLAND: HealthTech company ReproNovo raises €57 million (USD $65 m) to tackle declining fertility rates. Founded in 2021, ReproNovo is developing novel approaches to both male and female infertility as well as uterine health. One of ReproNovo’s assets is a first-in-class therapy for managing adenomyosis which the start-up also plans to explore for improving success rates in assisted reproductive technologies. This round was led by Jeito Capital, AXA IM and M Ventures, alongside a syndicate of healthcare funds including Ysios Capital and ALSA Ventures. (Continue reading: Eu-startups)
🌟 Industry news from this week
📌 U.S: Sonrai and AOA Dx partner to accelerate development of ovarian cancer test. Diagnosing women with ovarian cancer when symptoms first occur could transform their care pathway, and ultimately change outcomes, whilst offering significant savings to healthcare systems. This strategic partnership allows AOA Dx to leverage Sonrai’s cloud-based advanced analytics platform as it continues to build what it says is the first test to diagnose ovarian cancer in symptomatic women. Sonrai’s platform will support AOA to validate diagnostic biomarkers for its test. (Continue reading: Medtech Insights)
📌 U.S: Midi Health launches longevity arm to reach the millions of women ‘lost to medical care’. Four years after launch, Midi Health has recognized that the healthcare gap for women extends well beyond menopause. Now the company is expanding into the fast-growing longevity space to support women aged 35 to 65. Its new program, AgeWell, offers annual diagnostic visits, personalized ‘longevity plans’ and ongoing education designed to help women optimize their health through lifestyle changes, tests and preventative care. Notably, AgeWell is covered by private insurance nationwide, eliminating membership fees, though standard copays may apply. (Continue reading: Fortune)
📌 U.S: Fuze Health launches, uniting Truepill, LetsGetChecked, and Alto to transform at-home personalized care. Newly-launched healthcare solutions company Fuze will enhance its women’s health services by integrating Alto Pharmacy, a digital pharmacy which has specialised in women’s health including nationwide fertility treatment delivery. Fuze will offer at-home lab tests, genomic testing and 24/7 virtual support, expanding access to essential therapies for women across the U.S (Continue reading: Hit Consultant)
📌 GLOBAL: New market map for perimenopause and menopause. Female researchers, founders, clinicians, and public figures are speaking openly about the once-taboo life stage of perimenopause and menopause and working toward a better model of care. This new horizon map, produced by Femovate, surfaces companies across the continium of care and helpfully maps them by level of clinical validation. (Continue reading: Femovate on LinkedIn)
🩸 Research and women’s health news
📌 UK: Heavy periods affect school attendance and exam scores, study in England finds. Charities say more should be done to support girls who experience prolonged bleeding and severe menstrual pain after a new study found it was associated with missing an additional 1.7 days of school every year. The symptoms were also associated with achieving one grade lower at GCSE - as well as 27% lower odds of achieving five standard GCSE passes, which are often needed to go onto the next stage of education. Access to toilets during lessons, menstrual anxiety / embarrassment and debilitating symptoms were all highlighted as contributing factors. (Continue reading: The Guardian)
📌 UK: Social media more likely to suppress women's health over men's, say young adults. A study of 4,000 adults found that 77% of those aged 18-34 turn to social media to educate themselves about male and female health - but many struggle to find what they need. A significant majority of adults (77%) expressed that terms like 'vagina' or 'periods' should not be censored on social media when used for educational purposes. The research is part of a campaign by global health company Essity in partnership with advocacy campaign CensHERship (which FutureFemHealth is a co-founder of!) and Period Equity Alliance. The campaign calls upon social media companies to take action and the Government to help find solutions. (Continue reading: Daily Mirror)
📄 Govt & policy news
📌 GLOBAL: Prescription for change: policy recommendations for women’s health research. We know that addressing the women’s health research gap is not just an ethical imperative but also a critical step towards more robust science and better health outcomes for all. This white paper, developed as a collaboration between the World Economic Forum’s Global Alliance for Women’s Health and more than 45 organizations from industry, regulators and beyond, proposes actionable policy recommendations to drive innovation, expand inclusion in clinical trials, enhance data disaggregation, design clinical trials with women in mind and deepen sex-specific insights. (Continue reading: World Economic Forum)
🎧 This week’s FemTech Focus podcast
AnelleO: 3D printing the future of vaginal drug delivery
💥 Meet Dr. Soumya Rahima Benhabbour, the brilliant chemist-turned-entrepreneur behind AnelleO, a UNC spinout using 3D printing to completely reimagine intravaginal rings for drug delivery. The AnelleO PRO is designed to release natural progesterone steadily over four weeks - a game-changing alternative to painful daily injections during fertility treatment.
Tune to find out how it works, why most vaginal rings waste 85% of the drug, and what it takes to take a product like this from lab bench to FDA approval.
🎧 Listen now or watch on YouTube
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.
