My dear Friends,

Have you ever wondered why so many treatments and pharmaceutical products do not help women as well as expected, or sometimes even make matters worse? Caroline Cerado Perez´s book “The Invisible Woman” offers many answers to this matter; it’s the industry’s historical bias toward treating male biology as the standard.

Data for women hardly exists, resulting in a lack of sex-disaggregated data.

However, if the headlines are to be believed, FemTech is on its way to becoming the next new boom industry. FemTech refers to products, technologies, and services focused on women’s health and wellbeing. Why all the excitement? Surprise, surprise, most medications or methodologies for that matter are not developed with any real data from women.

As usual, when something new comes along and is marketed cleverly, investors get a little giddy. It should be said that the procedure is pretty much the same for whatever industry and has become a well-tested routine: bold claims, hyped founders, a charismatic CEO, a touch of glamour, and predictions of unlimited growth. It always works,

Hold your horses for now. Do you remember Theranos? The ill-fated company that persuaded investors to part with billions by promoting a revolutionary healthcare device that never actually existed. Its founder, Elizabeth Holmes, was eventually convicted. Unfortunately, that offered little comfort to investors. Their money had long since disappeared.

On the positive side, FemTech is addressing an undeniably existing market. With 49.7% of the world’s population being women, the demand is there, and investments in an industry that advances women’s health should be self-perpetuating rather than just hype pushed by the industry, with the generous help of the media.

This innovative approach of the health industry could be a new boom industry after all, with exceptional chances for investors. Just the same, FemTech could simply be just another compelling story told by a particularly skilful narrator, and billions of investors´ money down the drain.

From Fertility To Menopause And Everything In Between

The FemTech sector focuses on the health issues women experience throughout their lives. The term was coined by Ida Tin, founder of the menstrual health app CLUE, and refers to software, diagnostics, apps, and other technologies designed to address women’s specific health needs.

At first glance, none of this sounds particularly out of the box. Most women would probably agree that these are not exactly niche issues. Yet for decades, many of these areas received strikingly little attention from researchers, investors, and product developers. Apparently, half the world’s population was indeed considered ” Invisible” or a niche market, not worth considering.

This is precisely what Ida Tin wanted to change. For her, FemTech was a way “to legitimise the female health tech market”. The goal was not only to drive innovation but also to attract investment and normalise conversations about women’s health. After all, it is difficult to solve problems that people are reluctant to discuss.

Investors eventually began to notice. According to a McKinsey study, funding for FemTech start-ups rose from virtually nothing in 2008 to almost $2.5 billion by 2021. The number of deals followed a similar trajectory, growing from a handful to almost 300 over the same period. Suddenly, what had long been overlooked was being discussed as a potential new boom industry.

“I went on to coin the term ‘FemTech’ as a way of helping to legitimise the female health tech market, thus driving forward innovation, attracting investment, and helping to normalise conversations about female health.”

Ida Tin, Founder and CEO of Clue

A Case Of Underrepresentation

One reason FemTech is attracting so much attention is that it addresses a problem that should probably never have existed in the first place: the underrepresentation of women in healthcare research and innovation.

Despite women spending an estimated $500 billion on healthcare each year, only around 4% of research and development funding has historically been allocated to conditions that affect women directly. That is a remarkable mismatch between demand and investment.

The Gender Data Gap in healthcare is equally well documented. Around 70% of people suffering from chronic pain are women, yet approximately 80% of pain studies have traditionally been conducted on male mice or men. Apparently, in medical research, male biology was considered the default setting.

The consequences are not trivial. Many healthcare products, medical devices, and treatment protocols were originally developed with the average 70-kilogram white male in mind. Women have also been underrepresented in clinical trials, leaving important biological differences poorly understood. As a result, women are estimated to be 20-30% more likely to receive an incorrect diagnosis.

Take heart attacks, for example. Most of us have been taught to associate them with chest pain and pain radiating down the left arm. For many women, however, symptoms can resemble severe heartburn, nausea, fatigue, or shortness of breath. One consequence is that women are around 50% more likely than men to be misdiagnosed following a heart attack and, tragically, face a higher risk of dying from one.

Hip implants provide another example. Many were originally designed around male anatomy and musculature, resulting in significantly higher failure rates for women. Even pain treatment is affected. Women reporting pain are still more likely to have their symptoms dismissed as emotional, stress-related, or psychosomatic.

Then there is medication. Women metabolise certain drugs differently and often more slowly than men. Yet dosage recommendations have historically been based largely on male participants. It is therefore perhaps unsurprising that women experience adverse drug reactions roughly twice as often as men. Other than certain women-specific cancers, female conditions comprise less than two per cent of the healthcare research and innovation pipeline.

Seen from this perspective, FemTech begins to look less like a fashionable trend and more like a long-overdue correction. The question is not whether there is a need for more women-centric healthcare. The question is why it took so long for innovators and investors to notice. So, FemTech could very well evolve into a genuine new boom industry after all.

“We need a lot more support from people who understand the need and value proposition of FemTech companies at the early stages.”

Sophie Smith, CEO and Founder of NATB Health

Speed Read

The FemTech sector primarily addresses the specific health issues women experience throughout their lives. The industry develops and produces digital devices- software, diagnostics, apps- to help alleviate and measure these health issues.

The health care industry suffers from historical data bias toward treating male biology as the standard. Data for women hardly exists, resulting in a lack of sex-disaggregated data.

For the healthcare industry and investors alike, 47,9% of the human population was ” Invisible” and received strikingly little attention

It is difficult to solve problems that people are reluctant to discuss.

FemTechpreneurs – mostly women seek to drive innovation, attract investment, and normalise conversations about women’s health.

Female founders generally face challenges securing VC funding. Only 2.3 per cent of venture capital funding goes to women-led startups.

From its humble beginnings in 2015 with $600 million of VC funding, the industry has grown to a $30 Billion industry by the end of 2022. Further, the projected market potential is $50 Billion by 2025.

In 2015, the FemTech industry raised $600 million of VC funding, by 2022 the industry has grown to a $30 Billion industry.

The projected market potential is $50 Billion by 2025.

The FemTech industry is definitely not just a movement, a new boom industry? That remains to be seen.

A New Boom industry or Just A movement

There is little doubt that FemTech is a mission-driven industry, and FemTech-preneurs are women with a vision set out to fill the gender health gap. Its goal is to make healthcare more inclusive, meet women where they are, and provide solutions that reflect the realities of women’s lives.

The industry‘s ultimate goal is to develop the tools to monitor women`s health more effectively and collect vital data that ultimately provides tailored solutions. It seems no market has ever been more ready!

#1 FemTech will transform how we collect healthcare data and how we use it.

#2 FemTech will revolutionize how patients communicate with doctors

#3 FemTech is redefining inter-patient communication.

The question now is: does being on a mission automatically entail forgetting about making a profit? Certainly not, and as can be seen, earnings in the FemTec industry are on an upward trajectory.

A product needs customers as much as companies need revenues and profits, regardless of how noble its mission may be. The encouraging news for FemTech entrepreneurs is that demand appears to be growing rapidly. What began as a niche sector attracted around $600 million in venture capital funding in 2015. By the end of 2022, FemTech had grown into a $30 billion industry, with estimates suggesting a market potential of $50 billion by 2025.

The numbers certainly look impressive. But even the most promising FemTech start-ups need capital to develop products, conduct research, navigate regulation, and scale their businesses.

And that raises an interesting question: who is willing to fund a sector that many investors have barely noticed until recently?

“The women’s health and sexual health space is massively underserved. And it’s only recently with a new demographic of venture capitalists that we’re seeing investments go toward other areas besides fertility.” 

Carli Sapir, Partner at Amboy Street Venture

Funds For A New Industry: The Obstacles

The biggest challenge for FemTech founders is that venture capital remains largely male-dominated. That matters. If the people assessing an investment opportunity have limited knowledge of women’s health, the FemTech market, or the scale of the problem being solved, even a promising business can be misunderstood.

This is one reason much early FemTech funding flowed into fertility. Infertility had already been defined by the WHO as a disease and a public health issue, which meant there was more data available. And venture capital loves data. Once numbers could be shown, the sector became easier to explain, model, and therefore fund. Infertility became a pretty safe investment.

The wider funding problem remains. Only a small share – 2.3% – of venture capital goes to women-led start-ups, and pitch style may play a part. The venture capital world is used to enormous visions, dramatic growth forecasts, and the occasional unicorn fantasy dressed as a business plan. Female founders often present more measured, realistic projections, which should be an advantage, but in a room trained to reward theatre, restraint can be mistaken for lack of ambition.

There is another snag, a lack of sizable exits. Investors usually want proof that similar companies have grown, been acquired, or successfully gone public. Money managers have a duty to develop a general thesis about a market before investing. FemTech is still an emerging industry; there are fewer large exit stories to point to. That makes it harder for investors to build a confident market thesis, even when the need is obvious.

To secure funding, most FeTech founders struggle to be entrepreneurs, advocates, and patients simultaneously. Many have their own troublesome medical history. Often, it was the sheer desperation and the long-suffering that led to the business concept. This is likely why investors, quite wrongly, label the industry a movement rather than focusing on the business concept destined to make money.

If founders speak too little about their own experience, they may be seen as insufficiently committed. If they speak too much about it, they risk being labelled as too emotional. One might call this a narrow path. The usual unnecessary obstacle course that women are still expected to navigate when trying to raise funds, no matter what the idea.

So yes, FemTech may well become a new boom industry. But before that happens, founders need access to capital, investors need a better understanding, and the industry needs to be judged as a serious business opportunity, not merely a worthy cause with a pitch deck.

“If you look at investment dollars this year a lot more than ever has gone to Series A and seed stage. I think that’s a signal that this isn’t going away and that people are really diving [into] new, innovative technologies.”

Chis Moniz, Market Manager Silicon Valley Bank

About Scalability And Growth

More recently, some femtech companies are seeing triple-digit growth and funding rounds measured in millions of dollars, rather than thousands. Industry forecasts predict the market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 16.2% between 2021 and 2027. FemTech Analytics estimates the sector could exceed $60 billion within the next decade.

Naturally, this raises a question: why the sudden interest?

Part of the answer lies in changing social attitudes. Women’s health can no longer be treated as a niche topic. Cultural shifts, greater awareness, and broader conversations about diversity and inclusion have brought many previously overlooked issues into the mainstream.

The pandemic accelerated this trend. It exposed the healthcare challenges many women face while also increasing acceptance of digital health tools and remote healthcare solutions. At the same time, years of low interest rates and abundant investment capital encouraged investors to seek new opportunities in emerging industries.

The demographics are equally compelling. Research suggests women are 75% more likely than men to use digital healthcare tools. The Female Founders Fund estimates that by 2023, approximately 1.1 billion women worldwide will be postmenopausal, creating significant demand for innovation, services, and specialised products.

For investors, this combination of unmet demand, technological innovation, changing consumer behaviour, and favourable demographics is difficult to ignore. FemTech addresses challenges that have existed for generations but have only recently begun attracting serious entrepreneurial and investment attention.

However, will this trend last, especially with rising interest rates?

So, will FemTech become the next new boom industry? Nobody knows. But unlike many en vogue investment narratives, the underlying market is real, the customer base is enormous, and the problems being solved are unlikely to disappear any time soon.

The Verdict: Clearly not just A new Movement

This combination of unmet demand, technological innovation, changing consumer behaviour, and favourable demographics is difficult to ignore.

FemTech is undoubtedly an industry with significant growth potential. It is fresh, exciting, and the future. But check idea, product and demand first before you add a FemTech start-up to your portfolio.

This is a really important message:

Always bear in mind that how you think about money determines your life!

– yours, Harper