Every Monday we share a quick “best of” from the week that was in the world of women’s health innovation with our Inner Circle members. What’s trending in the Femtech Insider community and beyond? Read on!
The Future of Menstrual Health
Last week femtech startup Guud, a DTC company focused on menstrual health, launched its new products in the European market. British Jennis recently introduced its wellness app, helping women map their workouts to their cycle. Startups like Daye or August are reinventing the cycle care category through customer centricity and radical focus on inclusivity. Clearly menstrual health startups are making headlines these days, and expanding the definition of menstrual health startup" beyond the cycle tracker.
Trend Forecasting Agency Ultra Violet recently explored the space and published a deep-dive into the 'Future of Cycle Care', which is a great framework for those looking to understand the trends beyond the headlines. Most definitely worth a read!
The Key Trends Ultra Violet Identified:
Precision Health: "For women, and people who menstruate, an increased thirst for knowledge is often met with the reality of the gender data gap. Tired of the lack of access to accurate information specific medical needs, people are taking back ownership of their health and playing a more active role in their healthcare experience."
Wellness Pollination: "Consumers now demand that wellness and self-care is baked into every element of their life."
Planet Positive: "People now expect a choice of eco-friendly alternatives to suit their needs without sacrificing comfort, style or finances."
Radical Inclusivity: "The move towards a more inclusive future sees brands take this one step further, practicing radical empathy as part of the design process and ensuring the consumer is involved in every stage from product development to marketing."
Curious? Download Ultra Violet's Full Report on 'The Future of Cycle Care: 2022'
💡 Related Reads:
- The Case for Her's Louise Klintner: "Menstrual product stigma has a significant bearing on market logics." (Read)
- New Study Reveals Large Gaps in Men's Knowledge of Menstruation (Read)
- The Overlooked Investment Opportunity: Menstrual Health (Read)
- Period Care Needs to be Inclusive of All People Who Menstruate (Read)
Femtech Exits
Medtech company Minerva Surgical was founded in 2008 and is focused on minimally invasive alternatives to hysterectomy. Just days ago they filed for IPO seeking to raise up to $100M. While IPOs are always exciting, especially in a nascent industry such as femtech, it can be hard to keep track sometimes.
One great resource helpful in this context to follow exits, IPOs and such is the Femtech Exit Database curated by Femtech Focus, which currently lists 106 exits and is updated on a regular basis.
Explore Femtech Exits Database
Axios Deep Dive: Femtech Lifts Women's Health
In a recent deep dive, Axios explored women's health with a special focus on how women in the U.S. access critical care. Definitely a worthwhile read and we've shared some of the topics covered below:
A generational shift on women's health: Women's health is undergoing a generational cultural change. Younger women talk more openly about their periods and sexual health concerns — and more companies are marketing to them with messages that women only whispered about a few years ago.
Medicine's trust problem among women: The lingering legacy of clinical trials failing to include women as participants, combined with frequent gaslighting by doctors and a general lack of research on women's bodies, has led many to mistrust medicine. This mistrust plus a constant barrage of misinformation can influence women's health decisions
The vanishing access to abortion providers: Now that a Texas law has banned abortion in the state after six weeks, more states are expected to follow suit, making access to women’s health care in certain parts of the country even harder than it already is.
Women's heart disease risk rises with COVID: The pandemic may have put millions of more women — particularly young women — unknowingly on track for heart disease complications. Several studies have emerged in the past year sounding alarms on how pandemic stressors like the increasingly difficult work-life balance, caregiving burdens and social isolation have left women bearing the brunt of this epidemic.
Medicaid's safety net for pregnant women: Fewer women are uninsured (10.5%) nationally than men (13.4%), due in large part to Medicaid providing pregnancy coverage for low-income women.
The ACA didn't solve birth control access: One of the best-known protections of the Affordable Care Act was a requirement that contraception be 100% covered by insurers — but that doesn't always mean women are able to access the birth control their doctor prescribed for them. In many cases, the newest contraceptives on the market are not covered — even when they are recommended by the patient's doctor — because an insurer's formulary calls for an older version of the same method.
Read Axios AM Deep Dive on Women's Health
