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Why investing in women’s health innovation is a smart bet

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By David Buller, Managing Partner at KELES

The macro opportunity: women are half of the population

In 2024 alone, women’s health start-ups raised a record $2.6 billion, up 55 per cent from the previous year.

In addition to increasingly recognised health needs in menopause, fertility and female-specific cancers, there are conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes and Alzheimer’s, to name a few, that affect women disproportionately as compared to men, which then leads to the creation of large care gaps.

Whilst conventional care pathways, medications, dosages and treatments are often geared to accommodate males, this has created gaps in clinical pathway guidelines for women and their health.

The opportunity for transforming and investing in women’s health is growing. Where should investors focus capital, and what will substantially improve women’s health for the future?

Venture Capital will back scalable, system-level solutions

Despite the growing attention on women’s health and FemTech, successful venture-backed companies need to attract the female healthcare population.

The technologies that do this will be those that are payor-reimbursed (government, insurance or employer), can embed into patient care pathways, address wide-scale unmet needs, and have a clear exit strategy. Women’s health companies, just like any other digital health venture, need to consider how they integrate with the health system as a whole and forge a clear route to market.

The best companies will drive the new standard of care and address critical needs, for example, those improving essential surgeries, or developing new therapies, and those that substantially increase quality of life for a significant number of women.

With these considerations about scaling and prevalence in mind, the opportunities for founders and investors are great. What kind of technologies should we consider?

  1. Those combating major gaps in existing care pathways. For example, endometriosis affects an estimated 10 per cent of women, yet diagnostic delay still averages eight years. Technologies that shorten diagnosis transform millions of lives and are rapidly adopted by payers.
  2. AI and platform technologies. Utilising the latest AI capabilities can improve accuracy and speed in health, especially in diagnostics and drug development, and support the vision of care for women. We must ensure that data is representative of women and female patient groups. Greater assimilation and integration of truly representative datasets can allow more informed care decisions, and can enhance female patient selection for clinical trials.
  3. High-prevalence conditions and health issues. Some conditions affect a startling number of women and can contribute to significant strains on global health systems. Fertility and pregnancy, post-partum depression, endometriosis, menopause and osteoporosis, breast cancer and diabetes are just some examples of highly prevalent and widespread health needs. AI and tech enable a huge step change in addressing issues that were completely undertreated.

Building a women’s health ecosystem that thrives: future innovation will originate from women

Achieving a healthy ecosystem of market-ready innovations in women’s health requires more than collaboration between start-ups, healthcare providers and investors. It needs a momentum of female-led founders to break the barriers, and get the right tech, innovation and products to the women who need them.

Breakthrough ideas often come from those who have experienced the pain points firsthand. Yet, if we look at women’s health, fewer than one in five digital-health start-ups is founded by a woman, and the percentage drops further in med-tech and biotech.

Encouragingly, the raw talent already exists. Across Europe, women already dominate many healthcare practitioner positions and master’s level qualifications in health and life sciences, and in many EU countries, they hold a slight majority of PhDs in these fields. Cities such as Lisbon, Copenhagen and Barcelona are making progress on gender balance among principal research investigators.

The challenge is in the translation: channeling the expertise into biotech and health companies that will scale well and make a significant impact on women’s health. So we should continue:

  • Encouraging women in the scientific and healthcare ecosystem to experiment and innovate, and bring new technologies to market.
  • Building an inclusive environment for female founders.
  • Investing in female-led companies producing scalable solutions for women’s health.
Measuring returns by better health: an investor’s framework

Adhering to strong ethical principles is a core foundation of any good investment in healthcare. By embedding these principles into an investment framework, we are more likely to see capital deliver sustainable, long-term value.

At KELES, we evaluate our portfolio companies against core criteria. Applying these criteria to solutions for women’s health, companies can drive significant innovation and progress to support equitable healthcare. Many women’s health companies have the opportunity to meet and exceed these principles, and drive significant innovation and progress to support equitable healthcare.

  • Accessibility – does the solution broaden access and availability of healthcare for women?
  • Ethical use of data – is sensitive health data handled with the highest standards of privacy and fairness, and includes truly representative data?
  • Improved outcomes – does the technology enhance healthcare outcomes for women?

By tying capital to these measurable goals in women’s health, and prioritising investments in women-led ventures that show clear market value, we can accelerate innovation that truly meets women’s healthcare needs – and has real impact worldwide.

Pregnancy

New reporting tool targets maternal-fetal teams as pregnancy complexity rises

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A new reporting tool built specifically for obstetrics and maternal-fetal medicine has launched, aimed at teams managing increasingly complex pregnancies with limited time and resources.

Trice Imaging has released Trice Workspace Reporting, which connects imaging, reporting and longitudinal patient data in a single workflow to support faster clinical decision making.

Birth rates are falling worldwide, but pregnancies are getting more complicated. Advanced maternal age, IVF-assisted pregnancies, rising obesity rates and a higher prevalence of hypertension and diabetes mean more cases now require specialist monitoring, advanced imaging and multidisciplinary care.

At the same time, clinical teams are stretched and facing growing administrative demands.

Trice Workspace Reporting brings together customisable reporting, dynamic pregnancy dating and longitudinal patient history with an AI-ready, EHR-interoperable infrastructure, all inside the company’s Tricefy image management platform.

The company says it aims to accelerate standardised and synchronised report turnaround, support timely clinical decisions and improve operational efficiency for fetal medicine services.

“Maternal fetal medicine teams are managing increasingly complex pregnancies while being asked to do more with limited time and resources,” said Mark A. Samii, chief revenue officer at Trice Imaging.

“Trice Workspace Reporting is designed to remove unnecessary friction from reporting by creating a structured digital foundation that supports today’s need for connected clinical workflows.

“It also provides a digital foundation as practices prepare for tomorrow and the evolution of AI-enabled fetal assessment, anomaly detection and outcome prediction technologies.”

Trice Imaging describes its mission as transforming the women’s health journey by connecting physicians, patients and healthcare systems. From independent practices to large hospital ecosystems, it aims to reach the entire women’s health continuum, spanning IVF and reproductive health, maternal-fetal medicine and OB/GYN, and onwards to lifelong women’s health.

For more than 17 years the firm has worked on cloud-based storage, retrieval, display, organisation and exchange of ultrasound medical images and associated information across health environments.

Its wider platform now extends to dynamic clinical reporting, AI-driven workflow optimisation, data analytics and secure patient engagement.

Trice Imaging holds regulatory and data protection clearances in 40 countries. It has offices in Miami and Stockholm, alongside a growing network of global distributors.

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Diagnosis

Two “gamechanger” tests set to speed up endometriosis diagnosis on the NHS

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Two endometriosis tests could cut years from diagnosis after NICE backed their temporary NHS use in England and Wales.

EndoSure and Endotest have been recommended in draft guidance, with one able to provide results in 45 minutes.

Endometriosis affects around one in 10 women of reproductive age. It occurs when tissue similar to the womb lining grows elsewhere, including around the ovaries and fallopian tubes.

Symptoms can include painful periods, painful bowel movements, pain when urinating and pain during or after sex.

Diagnosis can involve ultrasound scans, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or laparoscopy. A laparoscopy is keyhole surgery in which a camera is inserted through a small cut in the abdomen.

Despite the effect the condition can have on physical and mental health, women can wait years for a diagnosis.

The average wait in the UK is nine years and four months, rising to 11 years for women from ethnically diverse communities, according to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

Long waits can increase suffering, prolong poor health and allow the condition to progress, making it more difficult to treat.

Dr Anastasia Chalkidou, NICE’s healthtech programme director, said: “A diagnosis of endometriosis can for some women take the best part of a decade, with the UK average standing at nine years and four months, and rising to 11 years for those from ethnically diverse communities.”

She said delays could lead to chronic pain affecting daily life, relationships and work.

She added: “These technologies have the potential to change that by giving primary care professionals better non-invasive tools to identify endometriosis earlier, allowing earlier and better treatment.

“Our draft guidance reflects our commitment to getting promising innovations to patients quickly, while making sure the evidence to support their wider use is built in a rigorous way.”

Endotest examines a saliva sample for microRNAs, tiny biological markers that can indicate the presence of endometriosis.

The sample is sent to a laboratory and the result returned to a GP or another healthcare professional to inform the next steps in diagnosis and care.

EndoSure uses sensor pads placed on the abdomen to measure electrical signals in the gut.

Women must fast for between six and eight hours before the 45-minute test. During the procedure, they drink water until they feel full, helping the device record gut activity accurately.

Results are available as soon as the test is complete.

The draft recommendation, published on Tuesday, approves both technologies for three years while further evidence is collected on how well they work.

NICE will then decide whether to approve them permanently for NHS use.

NICE said a third test, DotEndo, needs more research before it can be recommended.

EndoSure and Endotest are not designed to diagnose the condition on their own.

They are intended for women whose symptoms still suggest endometriosis after a normal clinical examination and negative or inconclusive imaging results, or when imaging has not been carried out.

Dr Gail Busby, a consultant gynaecologist at Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, said: “These tests are a gamechanger because they give us answers much earlier, without the need for invasive surgery, and that means we can start the right treatment sooner.

“An earlier diagnosis doesn’t just change one person’s life, it frees up appointments and surgical slots for everyone waiting for care.”

Emma Cox, of Endometriosis UK, welcomed the tests.

She said their introduction should be supported by education for GPs and nurses to ensure prompt access and prevent symptoms from going unrecognised.

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Entrepreneur

Xella launches AI-powered precision health platform

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Xella Health has launched what it calls the first AI precision health platform built for the XX chromosome.

The company says it aims to address a lack of diagnostic precision and clinical research focused on female biology.

Women make up half of the population and account for 80 per cent of consumer healthcare decisions, but research into women’s health has historically received less funding than male-focused studies.

Kelly Lacob, Xella Health co-founder and chief executive, said: “Women have been trapped in a diagnostic dark age experiencing debilitating symptoms like severe period pain, bloating and GI issues, exhaustion, and brain fog, routinely dismissed by the healthcare system.

“This dismissal results in women being diagnosed four years later than men, on average, for the same conditions, and a seven-to-10-year delay for women to receive an accurate diagnosis for conditions like endometriosis.

Stalling necessary care and treatment results in prolonged suffering with chronic pain, heightened infertility risks, and declining mental health.

Xella is here to replace the systemic medical gaslighting women have endured for generations.

We are handing women the evidence and information they need to advocate for themselves and secure faster, accurate diagnoses before early-stage conditions spiral.”

Xella says its AI examines billions of data points from clinical information and multi-omic biomarkers to assess the probability of more than 130 conditions specific to female biology.

Multi-omic data combines information from several biological areas, including genes, proteins and hormones.

The conditions assessed include polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome, or PMOS, formerly known as polycystic ovary syndrome, as well as perimenopause and endometriosis.

Xella was founded by Lacob, Adriana Dantas and Dr Jesus Ching, who developed the concept while working together on molecular diagnostics at Mammoth Biosciences.

The founders say the platform is designed to provide information about possible underlying causes through advanced testing and long-term care of a kind often available only through expensive concierge services.

They drew on personal experiences to build a service intended to identify small changes in a woman’s biological baseline.

Members complete an initial health questionnaire before having blood taken at a local partner laboratory such as Quest or Labcorp.

A phlebotomist can also visit a member’s home for an additional charge.

The company’s AI analyses biomarker data from genomics, proteins and hormones alongside symptoms, lifestyle risks and medical history.

Xella says this information is used to screen for more than 130 female-specific conditions, including PMOS, Hashimoto’s disease, premenstrual dysphoric disorder, endometriosis and perimenopause timelines.

Hashimoto’s disease is an autoimmune condition in which the immune system attacks the thyroid gland.

Premenstrual dysphoric disorder, or PMDD, is a severe form of premenstrual syndrome that can cause significant emotional and physical symptoms.

The results are processed through Xella’s own dry laboratory, which the company says is certified under the US Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments and accredited by the College of American Pathologists.

A dry laboratory analyses data using computing and other non-experimental methods rather than carrying out traditional laboratory procedures.

The findings are turned into a personalised healthcare plan and reviewed with a certified telehealth doctor.

The doctor may recommend immediate clinical action, including personalised hormone therapy or referrals to genetic counsellors, pelvic floor physiotherapists and reproductive endocrinologists.

Reproductive endocrinologists are doctors who specialise in hormones, fertility and reproductive health conditions.

Dantas, co-founder and chief operating officer, said: “Women’s health data has historically been treated in isolated silos – a hormone test here, an ultrasound there – but no one was connecting the dots across the entire biology.

“By tracking unique biological patterns longitudinally across cycles and life stages, we aren’t just providing data, but a clear path forward.”

Xella’s clinical advisers include Dr Allison Kurian, director of Stanford Women’s Clinical Cancer Genetics Program and professor of medicine, epidemiology and population health at Stanford.

They also include Dr Lynn Westphal, a reproductive endocrinology and infertility specialist and chief medical officer of Kindbody.

Xella has received US$4.7m in angel and pre-seed funding from Precursor Ventures, Capital F, Ulu Ventures and Swizzle Ventures.

Other funds and angel investors from healthcare, diagnostics and consumer technology also participated.

Margaret Coblentz, co-founder and general partner of Capital F, said: “Women’s health is one of the highest-momentum categories in the market today, driven by a US$15tn female economy.

“Xella represents exactly how Capital F sees women’s health evolving: deep clinical expertise paired with a consumer-first mindset, and a genuine opportunity to unlock the next generation of healthcare.”

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