Entrepreneur
Pomelo Care raises US$92m at US$1.7bn valuation
Pomelo Care has raised US$92m in Series C funding at a US$1.7bn valuation as it expands its virtual maternity model into wider women’s and children’s healthcare.
The New York-based company, which says it now covers nearly 7 per cent of US births, plans to use the funding to extend its model beyond maternity into reproductive care, paediatrics, perimenopause and menopause.
Founded in 2021, Pomelo delivers 24/7 virtual care through a team of nurses, dietitians, therapists, doulas and providers.
The company partners with health plans and employers, covering more than 25 million lives across the US.
The company claims its model has achieved a 37 per cent reduction in preterm births, a 46 per cent reduction in emergency room visits and a 6.8-day reduction in neonatal intensive care unit (intensive care for newborns) stays.
Marta Bralic Kerns, founder and chief executive of Pomelo Care, said: “Pomelo Care was founded to measurably improve maternal health in the United States.
“We’ve demonstrated that when care is proactive, evidence-based, and accountable, we improve outcomes and costs come down.
“Now, with this funding, we’re taking that proven model beyond maternity to build a system of care that supports women and children throughout their lives, delivering better results across the entire healthcare ecosystem, for patients, payers, providers, and employers alike.”
The company recently launched a midlife care programme addressing perimenopause and menopause, the transitional phases when women’s hormone levels change.
It claims an 88 per cent reduction in symptoms within 60 days and says 73 per cent of patients report increased productivity.
The funding round was led by Stripes, with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, PLUS Capital, Atomico, BoxGroup and SV Angel.
Ron Shah, partner at Stripes, said: “Pomelo has reached national scale at an unprecedented rate, now serving 25 million covered lives through Commercial and Medicaid health plan partnerships across the United States.
“The power of Pomelo’s amazing product is clear: exceptional patient satisfaction and strong clinical results showing meaningful reductions in pregnancy-related complications.”
Stanford graduates’ startup Clair is building a wearable hormone tracker for women, offering continuous, non-invasive monitoring.
The company, Clair, founded by Jenny Duan and Abhinav Agarwal, aims to build what its founders describe as a research-led, privacy-focused tool to help women see how hormone levels affect daily life.
Duan and Agarwal met in spring 2025 and began working on Clair shortly after. Over the past six months, they have been developing the technology and refining the company’s mission.
The device is designed to address gaps in women’s healthcare. Women remain underrepresented in medical research and clinical trials, leading to limited data and slower progress in understanding women’s health conditions.
According to Clair advisor and Stanford Medicine professor Brindha Bavan, hormone tracking in reproductive healthcare “improves our understanding of the function of and communication between the brain’s pituitary gland and ovaries or testes.
The pituitary gland is a small organ at the base of the brain that produces hormones regulating many bodily functions. The ovaries and testes are the primary reproductive organs that also produce sex hormones.
Hormonal health affects not only fertility and reproduction but also mental health, metabolism, energy levels and overall wellbeing.
Bavan said hormone tracking can “provide insight into menstrual cycle patterns and can aid with both diagnosing and assessing treatment for [various] conditions.”
“[Clair enables] patients [to] gain insight into their personal hormone fluctuations over different time periods,” Bavan said, “and share this information at healthcare visits to better understand and correlate any medical issues they are facing and avoid repeat blood draws.”
The device, which resembles a bracelet worn on the wrist, will connect to a mobile app, allowing all data processing to occur directly on the user’s phone rather than in external data centres.
“The device connects with an app so all of the processing happens on the app itself, not in a data centre like other devices. This is especially important given the current political climate around data privacy,” Agarwal said.
Clair also plans to pursue FDA approval and position itself as a medically credible device rather than solely a lifestyle product. The company is planning to launch a clinical trial at Stanford Medicine this spring.
Duan’s interest in women’s health and technology began as a Stanford undergraduate. At TreeHacks in 2024, she built apps focused on endometriosis, a condition where tissue similar to the lining of the womb grows outside of it.
She said a course on Philanthropy for Sustainable Development was particularly influential. “It was this class that sparked my interest in building a solution in [the women’s healthcare] space,” Duan said.
Rapidly scaling startups often make rushed hiring choices that disadvantage women, a recent study has found.
The findings draw on more than 31,000 new ventures founded in Sweden between 2004 and 2018.
Researchers at the Stockholm School of Economics report that in male-led startups, scaling reduces the odds of hiring a woman by about 18 per cent, and the odds of appointing a woman to a managerial post by 22 per cent.
Mohamed Genedy is co-author and postdoctoral fellow at the House of Innovation, Stockholm School of Economics.
Genedy said: “During those moments of rapid growth, even well-intentioned leaders can fall back on familiar stereotypes when assessing who they believe is best suited for the role.”
The patterns emerge even in Sweden, regarded as a highly gender-equal national context.
Founders with human resources-related education counteract these challenges.
In ventures led by founders with HR training, the odds of hiring a woman increase by more than 30 per cent, and the odds of appointing a woman to a managerial role increase by 14 per cent for the same level of growth.
Genedy said: “When founders have experience with structured hiring practices, the gender gaps shrink, and in some cases even reverse.
“This shows that getting the basics of HR right early on really pays off.
“When things start moving fast, founders with HR knowledge are less likely to rely on biased instincts and more likely to hire from a broader talent pool.”
Prior experience in companies with established HR practices also helps, though to a lesser degree.
It raises the likelihood of hiring women as ventures scale, but does not significantly affect managerial appointments.
The study additionally shows these patterns are not driven by founder gender alone.
Even solo female-led ventures display similar tendencies when growing rapidly, though to a somewhat lesser degree.
In female-dominated industries, rapid growth increases the hiring of women for regular roles but still reduces the likelihood that women are appointed to managerial positions.
“When scaling accelerates, cognitive bias kicks in for everyone. Female founders are not immune to these patterns,” said Genedy.
Midi Health has closed a US$100m Series D, lifting the menopause care provider to a valuation above US$1bn and achieving unicorn status.
The company, originally focused on virtual menopause care, says it will expand to what it calls lifelong care, adding cardiology, obesity management, autoimmune survivorship and longevity services.
Joanna Strober is co-founder and chief executive officer of Midi Health.
She said: “This is validation for the movement we’re leading.
“Women’s health has been treated like an afterthought for too long.”
Midi reports it now sees more than 25,000 patients per week and has insurance coverage reaching 45 million women nationwide.
To support scale, the firm is rolling out a proprietary artificial intelligence engine intended to slot into clinical workflows.
It analyses patient charts before virtual visits to help personalise care, automates triage and documentation, and reviews data on midlife women to refine protocols.
The company has also strengthened its leadership. Jason Wheeler, formerly in senior finance roles at Tesla and Google, has been appointed chief financial officer. He joins chief marketing officer Melissa Waters, previously at Meta and Lyft, and chief commercial officer Matt Cook.
Each year, about two million women in the US enter menopause.
Untreated symptoms are estimated to cost the economy US$25bn annually.
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