Exploremore FemHealthFocus Alternative routestoscale
Contents
Opportunities in women’s health: page 1
2025 insights | A market primed for growth and impact: page 2
WHAM’s business case for accelerating women’s health investments: page 2
Women’s health | A trillion-dollar investment opportunity: page 3
PitchBook s Femtech VC market snapshot: page 3
Alternative routes to scale: page 4
A collective effort: Partnerships and collaborations: page 5
NHS collaboration: page 5
Partnering with the private sector: page 6
Pharmaceutical collaborations: an untapped opportunity: page 7
Accelerators: page 8
Networks: page 10
How WHIISH is accelerating investment: page 10
Contributions: page 12
We understand women’s health: page 13
Connect with us on LinkedIn: page 14
References: page 15
Opportun women’sh
The women’s health market is estimated to have a global value of $48.2bn. Although currently largely concentrated in the US, Europe is fast catching up. In 2024, the period tracking app Flo became the first European FemTech business to achieve unicorn status demonstrating that there is significant market potential in innovative, tech enabled solutions aimed at addressing the unmet health needs of 51% of the population.
Women’s health holds immense potential, yet glaring health inequalities between the sexes persist. Research published by McKinsey and the World Economic Forum in 2024 identifies disparities across the entire care pathway, from prevention to treatment and follow-up care. And the gaps extend beyond care delivery, encompassing the research, data, and investment that underpin it.
Against this backdrop, Mills & Reeve is hosting a series of roundtable events around the country focusing on how each of these gaps can be addressed to overcome the barriers to better health outcomes for women.
Bringing together key stakeholders from across the science, healthcare services, policy, business and investment sectors, each event will explore a key issue facing women's health: investment and support research and data policy and strategy
At this year’s JPM Healthcare Conference, the world’s largest healthcare investing conference that takes place in San Francisco, WHAM (Women’s Health Access Matters) presented its report, The Business Case for Accelerating Women’s Health Investment.
WHAM points to the significant opportunities for investing in companies focused on advancing the health of women. This untapped financial opportunity brings transformative potential not only to women, but for all of society, says WHAM.
WHAM believes that investing in the health of women is not only economically sound, but also a moral imperative.
With women’s health venture funding projected to reach $66bn by 2033, WHAM reports that it is a sector gaining momentum – and ready for growth:
Investments in women’s health grew by 300% between 2018 and 2023 –indicating tremendous opportunity given that only 2% of healthcare venture capital (VC) funding was allocated to women’s health.
35 successful exits in the past five years, including four IPOs and 31 mergers or acquisitions, proving the sector’s viability for high returns.
Governments in the developed world are finally waking up to the need to address long-standing health inequalities. The 2022 McKinsey report, Closing the Health Gap, found that women spend 25% more time in poor health compared to men, yet just 1% of healthcare research and innovation funding goes into femalespecific conditions. Closing that gap, it concluded, would not only improve the health of millions of women, but would boost the global economy by at least $1 trillion annually by 2040.
In the UK, menopause symptoms alone directly contribute to £1.5bn in annual economic losses while period pain, endometriosis, and related conditions cost the economy £11bn per year in absenteeism. In 2022, the government launched a ten-year strategy aimed at improving the health outcomes of women by ensuring access to services throughout their lives and boosting their voices in health policy.
The impetus to address the unmet health needs of women is far reaching, opening up new and varied pathways for growth and innovation in the women’s health market, creating opportunities for smart – and forward-thinking investors.
A new report analysing VC activity across more than 1,000 femtech companies provides a positive outlook for the market:
Femtech VC funding is rising, with the sector surpassing $1.2bn in 2024 – 20%
Expect more femtech unicorns with at least one high-profile sector IPO in the coming years with Flo, Maven, Kindbody, Comanche Biopharma and Elvie
Wearables, such as smart rings – are a standout category driving innovation in
Alternative routestoscale
Early-stage companies aiming to bridge gaps in the women’s health market, many of which are women-led, will, as well as looking for funding, be looking for additional opportunities to grow which may include partnerships, collaborations, contracting and mentorship.
VC funding might be the most common route for businesses in the women’s health space to develop their proposition and achieve scale, but it is by no means the only one.
Partnerships and collaborations with healthcare providers (both private and NHS), research institutions and the pharmaceutical industry, along with debt funding, are among other available funding options. These collaborations can sometimes lead to finding a more suitable funding partner who better understands the business opportunity and sector.
Participants at the roundtable also shared their experiences of working with accelerator programmes and securing grant-funding as well as contracting with the NHS and collaborating with the private sector and pharmaceutical companies.
Acollectiveeffort: Partnershipsand collaborations
NHScollaboration
In many ways the NHS could – and perhaps should – be the ideal partner for businesses operating in the women’s health space.
There is strong incentive in the NHS to adopt innovative approaches that can help bring down waiting lists for gynaecology, which have spiralled since the pandemic - at least three quarters of a million women are waiting for gynaecology treatment, a number that is growing.
Several women’s health businesses have successfully scaled by securing adoption of their products and services within the NHS. For those businesses who provide maternity education on labour, birth options, rights and choice, collaborating with the NHS is the ideal partner - supporting the NHS to provide equity in maternity care.
However, fragmentation and the pace of rolling out contracts can make it a long and arduous process.
There is also a dearth of data specific to women’s health. Women on any form of hormonal treatment are prohibited from taking part in clinical trials and a significant proportion of pharmaceutical companies do not collect gender specific data, including where women are in their menstrual cycle. This can make it difficult for businesses to demonstrate the evidence required for NHS adoption.
The roundtable agreed that the NHS could play a bigger role in helping to scale women’s health solutions, but recognised that with limited financial resources there were some things it would never be able to invest in.
With passion and purpose often the driving force behind women’s health businesses, this can be “a harsh reality for some founders to understand,” said one participant.
Strategic partnerships with the private sector can play a pivotal role in supporting health startups or maturing companies in the women’s health space achieve scale.
A good example is Holland & Barrett’s acquisition of Femtech startup, Parla, as part of its strategy to extend its reach beyond retail through the offer of personalised wellness solutions. Co-founded by Lina Chan and her husband in 2018, Parla’s mission is to support women’s mental wellness after pregnancy loss, and health challenges including endometriosis and PCOS. This partnership allowed Parla to leverage Holland & Barrett’s extensive resources and reach, significantly scaling its impact and user base.
Similarly, multinational pharmaceutical and life sciences companies like Bayer, AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Roche are helping to redefine and make influential contributions to women’s heath, fostering collaborative partnerships with startups to help empower, educate, and support innovation in women’s healthcare.
Sifted reports that the unicorn femtech app Flo is exploring startup acquisitions to expand into health verticals that could “significantly improve user experience” and speed up growth in current business segments following its 2024 fundraise.
Partnerships with the pharmaceutical industry can help close the health equity gap and provide access to research and development, data, and funding. As highlighted in the McKinsey report, biopharma can help close the knowledge gap about women’s health through commercialisation. The pharmaceutical industry has the capacity, and, crucially, the financial resources to support the growth and expansion of women’s health businesses.
While some founders remain cautious of “big pharma”, the roundtable highlighted the significant potential for mutually beneficial partnerships that not only address women’s unmet health needs but also benefit pharmaceutical companies through better uptake and adherence to their treatments, while offering a pathway to scale for innovators.
Pharmaceutical innovations are also driving early-stage businesses that address women’s health conditions. Companies like Theramex and Organon are dedicated to improving women’s health, focusing on areas such contraception, menopause, osteoporosis and fertility, as well as cardiovascular disease, respiratory conditions and immunology.
Any partnership agreements will require parties to consider the intellectual property (IP) position they wish to achieve in relation to ownership, exploitation and any enabling licensing between partners, as one participant said:
Participating in accelerator programmes provide early-stage innovators with access to capital and resources to help them develop and scale. The learning programme helps innovators with targeted workshops, peer learning and mentoring.
There are numerous programmes and initiatives aimed at driving forward health innovation and tech-driven solutions within women’s health. Funding is also available via organisations such as Innovate UK, Wellbeing of Women, Health Innovation Accelerating FemTech programme.
Opportunities to network and collaborate with peers across industry is also a key part of the programme.
Mentorship and sponsorship can play a significant role in facilitating those introductions and helping founders develop as leaders and as entrepreneurs.
Offering intense support, accelerators can be powerful tools for start-ups gearing up for investment providing knowledge around investment processes and potential sale opportunities, but they are time limited and don’t necessarily lead to the funding that is needed.
A key question to the roundtable was: can more be done to accelerate the growth of women’s health businesses in the local market and beyond?
The roundtable heard that a new initiative, WHIISH, the Women’s Health International Innovation Support Hub, could become a driving force for growth in the sector. Described as a “movement for women’s health”, WHIISH would aim to work with accelerators, investors, industry and other key stakeholders to provide the kind of wraparound support and community for Women’s Health businesses that has been missing from other programmes.
The ability to scale is an issue for women’s health businesses and will be “one of the prime drivers for businesses encouraged to come to Greater Manchester to help solve some of the issues around inequality in female health.”
There's complexity with a highly regulated landscape, the even greater need to protect privacy and difficulties accessing funding.
It's still a surprise to learn that women weren't required to be included in clinical trials until 1993. Since then, we've seen an increase in female clinical trial participants, but results are still not necessarily analysed by sex and/or gender – we're here to support those efforts in closing the gap.
With extensive experience across the technology, health and life science sectors, we can provide a “one-stop” legal service for innovators, investors and providers.
