UK fertility start-up bags £145,000 investment

The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority’s innovation commercialisation organisation LYVA Labs has invested £145,000 in fertility start-up Myma Medical to support couples struggling to conceive.

Infertility is the most common healthcare condition for 30-40 year olds, affecting around three and a half million people in the UK and 186 million worldwide.

Using automated technology, Myma Medical aims to improve success rates for people struggling with infertility by removing the current manual process and replacing it with an automated machine.

Currently, the process of physically taking the best sperm available to fertilise eggs by manual injection only has a 30 per cent success rate and is subject to human error. Myma Medical’s automated process aims to reduce the reliance on personal skill and increase success rates.

The automation process will also aim to eliminate the need for multiple procedures. These are often needed due to the low success rate, which comes at the cost of £10,000-12,000 per cycle.

“Myma Medical is a brilliant, innovative start-up with a model to significantly enhance the experiences of people struggling with their fertility,” said Lorna Green, CEO of LYVA Labs.

“So many of us are touched by fertility issues in our lives, either personally or through our communities so I am incredibly proud to bring a business like this to our ever-evolving region.”

She added: “I’m also pleased to see that again; we are using the Combined Authorities’ regional funding and support via LYVA Labs to establish a new company in the region and leverage national sources of innovation funding.

“It is vital we continue to support this approach to future-proof the investment cycles of early-stage businesses.”

Steve Rotheram, mayor of the Liverpool City Region, said: “People from the Liverpool City Region have got the talent, ambition and creativity to rival anywhere else in the world. But for too long, their potential has gone unfulfilled because of a lack of opportunities and investment. I launched LYVA Labs to help fix that.

“With nearly £11m of investment, we’re helping to turn great ideas into successful businesses, creating jobs, economic growth and prosperity for local residents.

“It’s fantastic to see this latest investment supporting a business that will not only generate new employment but deliver potentially life-changing support to families.”

Yash Khandhia , CEO of Myma Medical said: “We are excited to bring this innovative, game-changing technology to the fertility market to enhance the outcome of the treatments while saving money for the couples and improving their physiological and physical conditions.

“This technology is built through a great team effort over nearly a decade of fundamental and translational research.”

LYVA Labs has previously invested an initial £106,000 into Myma Medical, matched by a £390,000 Innovate UK SMART grant.

In its earlier years, the project secured financial support, totalling £351,000 from various scholarships, the Medical Research Council (MRC), Engineering and Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC), and ICURe (Innovate UK).