Lux Capital, which specializes in investments in science and technology, has led many funding rounds for a number of startups in recent years. Fertility services, the costs of which are still covered individually, are beginning to become a mainstream part of companies’ supply packages.
Many of the benefits are offered through partnerships with startups, which aim at a wider access to the health of the reproductive system, or even increase the likelihood of success among those trying to have a child.
This is a huge market, which is growing if you look at the demographic data, the decrease in sperm counts, the numbers worldwide as well as the new trends that come to cause the situations. Companies engaged in helping fertility also strive to offer solutions to inequalities, inefficiencies and the cost of services.
More specifically, investment in fertility increased between 2017 and 2020. But based on Crunchbase’s data, startups operating in the field of (female) reproduction have gathered a lot of interest, with funding having been boosted by up to 89%, from 93 million in 2020 up to 176 million dollars in mid-October 2021.
However, the drop in the birth rate especially in the U.S. during the pandemic may be temporary if more investments are made. Many estimate that young people will start recreating families, with roughly 15% of couples finding it difficult to get started, seeking help with innovative startups.
The fertility industry is a relatively new concept, after Facebook and Apple offered their female employees the option to freeze their eggs. Whether this encouragement to start a family replaces the parental leave they should also grant, prompting women to stay in their offices.
Fertility services are not only good for employees but also for businesses themselves, since privileges can come from a series of fundings granted to companies.
Clinical guidance and care in these matters for individuals is more expensive than for the companies themselves to invest in this area as a whole. A pregnancy, for example, can become more sustainably manageable if companies offer employees the necessary, reducing the time to adjust along the way.
Fertility naturally affects not only women but also men. Balancing family responsibilities by gender has also been put in the spotlight, distracting corporate interest in family planning.
Paternity leave, for one hand, has given many fathers the opportunity to stay home and not immediately return to the office, losing important moments from raising their children, seeking equality in taking responsibility.
In fact, Kate Ryder, CEO of unicorn Maven Clinic, an expanded digital clinic focused on women’s and family health, talks about high demand in the space.
In fact, the demand for family facilities, gestation and services to parents has quadrupled since the start of the pandemic when people began to adapt to a new health situation. This is where startups come in!
One of these startups is San Francisco-based Alife Health, which aims to reduce the overall cost of IVF by developing a program that will gather data for fertility treatment and use artificial intelligence to analyze information for clinicians.
Once operational, the platform will help doctors decide which treatments to use to improve a patient’s chances of getting pregnant by analyzing what has-or hasn’t worked in similar patients around the world.