Danish women’s health start-up wawa fertility launches in the UK

“The fertility industry is operating on a broken model, where the chance of success is low, the costs are too high for both patients and society, and patients suffer from mental health difficulties,” says Cecilie Hvidberg Jakobsen, CEO and founder of wawa.

“The fundamental issue is the lack of structured data and research into women’s health.

“This data gap has real implications for patients. For example, diagnosis of endometriosis, experienced by 30-40 per cent of infertile women, can take up to eight years.”

To solve this problem, wawa has created an app-based fertility assistant that supports women undergoing treatment, from pre-treatment to pregnancy.

Through the app, patients can record their treatment, connect with like-minded women, get knowledge and answers to questions from experts and be in control of their fertility journey.

“We know this helps,” the founder explains.

“Nine out of ten users say they feel more in control of their treatment and 70 per cent of them say they feel less stressed and alone.”

wawa has taken an active role in the industry, successfully campaigning for a change in fertility legislation, which the Danish parliament passed in 2021.

The company’s aim, Cecilie says, is to create a movement powered by women to change how women undergoing fertility treatment are treated.

The start-up has recently closed an investment round from the London-based investor MMC Ventures – part of the round is allocated to private investors and explicitly marketed to users and women in fertility treatment.

The funding will be used to accelerate growth and build a tool for fertility clinics to reduce the administrative burden of clinicians and improve treatment efficacy.

“We have been lucky to find some forward-thinking investors that believe in us and in the importance of changing the fertility treatment model, but it has been complicated to fundraise for a product focused on women’s health,” says Cecilie.

“Some investors needed education and guidance on the nuances of this industry, but that only underlines the importance of the work we are doing.”

MMC Ventures’ Feike Du says: “Furthering the everyday life of all women is a responsibility we all share.

“We are proud that the users of wawa take an active role in compiling data that has been lacking for decades, and we have a talented and dedicated team in place to deliver on the mission to close the data gap.”