Holly Scott 0:00
Steve, thanks for joining us this morning. So as our introduction gave the overview of Women's Health has historically been underrepresented in the investment community. We are here today to talk, talk about the big topic and elevate the conversation. Most importantly, we can't elevate the future without having some forensic discussion on how we got here. So without further ado, I'm going to allow our panel to introduce themselves and share who they are and why this particular area of the of the market is important to them. Terry, could you start Good morning
Terri Burke 0:38
everyone. I'm Terri Burke. I'm a venture partner with Epidarex capital. I'm also an independent director for radiant oximetry, a women's health company focused on labor and delivery. I think this is an important conversation, because we'll talk more about what our definition of women's health is, but I think it's an important conversation to be having, and it's important to look at the data and see where we can go.
Tara Ghazi 1:03
Good morning, everyone. I'm Dr Tara Ghazi. I'm co founder and CBO of MALCOVA. Now Malco is an early stage company. We're a medical imaging device company that focus on on resolving the need for improved breast cancer imaging among women with dense breasts.
Todd Usen 1:20
Good morning. My name is Todd. You said I'm the president and CEO of Minerva surgical it's a women's health company out in Santa Clara, California, focused on abnormal uterine bleeding, fibroids and hysteroscopy. And I'm looking forward to the conversation, yep,
Amrish Nair 1:34
and I'm Amrish, the co founder of biorhythm, whereas use a stage company looking at remote pregnancy monitoring and delivering access to care and ending preventable outcomes in pregnancy. Yeah. Thank you.
Holly Scott 1:47
Thank you. So to start, let's, let's establish some baseline communication here on the topic, because it's often misrepresented. Who would like to start? I'm going to start with Tara, actually, on why? What is women's health? Let's, let's define that for our audience, so we're all speaking the same language, please. Yeah, that's
Tara Ghazi 2:05
great, really. This is broadly anything that is impacting women's well being, ability to thrive, ability to live up to their potential, right? So this is, we're talking about physical, mental health issues, right? That really, it's it's the full scope of life for women. Yeah.
Holly Scott 2:22
Would you like to add anything?
Terri Burke 2:24
Yeah, I would add, for me, Women's Health is certainly not only reproductive health, but it also includes how we think about major disease categories like cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes, autoimmune diseases. So I think sometimes when we speak about women's health, it allows folks to narrow their definition to reproductive health, but I actually encourage everyone to think about, no matter what you're working on or what field you're in, really think about women's health and how is the disease state you're Thinking about potentially impacting women differently than men.
Todd Usen 3:01
Todd, you know, I look at it. When I took over Minerva, I was told, Well, it's great to see you focusing on women's health. I'd spent a long time in Boston, scientific and Smith and Nephew and Olympus, and every product that we developed, pretty much, is for all people. So I always thought we were always looking at women's health, you know, because women have these problems as well as men. So now that we're focused on a specific strategic area of women, just like the comparator would be just urology for men and just gynecology for women. So when you look at the investment, it's probably not that far off. So yes, we're going to complain that we want more money, but I just want to make sure that we're starting from a level set that women are getting great treatment opportunities across the world and all branches of medicine. So I look at everything as women and men health overall,
Amrish Nair 3:53
yep. And you know, it's really about, for me, disease that disproportionately affect women as well, right? And this is unique to women. And you know, even looking at a field like cardiology, and the fact that, you know, a lot of major academic institutions do not have a women's cardiology program. And I think, I think what is most unique to me was that seeing it as a continuum from pediatric, adolescent gynecology, moving into, you know, your 20s and 30s and reproductive phases of life into, you know, menopause, it's it sweeps across as a continuum, and we need to see it that way. And how do we understand risk? And, you know, prospective treatments for women as they move on into different phases of their life. So it's very broad and it's very sweeping, which is, I think, is one of the challenges in the field, but yeah, I think it's we have to treat it that way.
Holly Scott 4:45
Yeah, everyone's hit on some some good points in the in the big, broad scheme of things, that the health of women and the health of women as they are gender related, specifically, as well as clinical differentiation, so women Express. Differently, as Amish mentioned, the cardiovascular symptoms, two thirds of Alzheimer's patients are women. Women are four times more likely to be diagnosed with MS. Why Women of Color are three times more likely to die from pregnancy related complications? Why stroke kills more women than men? Why is this? We haven't had enough focused research in these areas to give good, definitive answers. So we'll get back to the data on why that's so important, and getting back to the clinical side. So to move forward, we must understand where we have been, and these these discussions are important. Amrit, I'm going to start with you. Why do you think the discussion on women's health has been less effective in creating investor interest.
Amrish Nair 5:45
I think looking at the more mature fields in med tech, right? You know, you have, your cardio, your neuro, I think you've seen the mature pathways towards building a company and exit, and they're clear acquirers in the space as well. If you're looking at the Boston size of the world, you know, and if you look at the women's health space, I think that pathway is less clear. If you look at the surgical space, maybe, but if you look at the broad spectrum of women's health, which encompasses digital health, wellness, medical device monitoring, I think that path is a lot less clear. And I think that's one of the reasons why I think we've been really seeing that it's been a challenge to communicate that value proposition across from how is the company properly valued and how is the space valued, towards what a potential outcome could be, into, this case, an exit, an IPO, or whatever it looks like, right? So I think, I think that's where we see the challenge. I think it's building the track record, which I think the current crop of innovators need to do
Todd Usen 6:44
Holly. If I could add, I think one of the reasons that we're seeing it, I look at two reasons. One, unfortunately, it's a very litigious space. We went through issuer, who went through mesh, went through morselation, and all around the same time. So I think unfortunate, and it doesn't mean the disease states went away and the patients don't need these procedures. So that's number one and number two. And GYN surgeons will share this with you publicly, because they're so open and honest, they're not at the top of the pecking order in the world of screaming for technology. So investors see that as well. So my CMO, who's a gynecological surgeon, he always says Our strength is catching babies, that's what he says, you know, so they get all the money they need in labor and delivery, but it's the same physicians that are doing surgery, and they're just not they're far down the pecking order in a hospital, and he says they're at the bottom of the surgery list. Doesn't mean they're bad, it's just that that's where they rank overall. So I think that's one of the reasons, too, that we're looked at with a little less.
Terri Burke 7:47
Yeah, I would add, from the venture perspective, you know, we're always looking for great opportunities, for growth, for unmet needs, but we need to see those exits too, because we're financial investors and we need to be able to have returns for our limited partners, and so think Emma, she talked about this a little bit, but the pathway to exit is less clear for women's health, or for the technologies that sort of primarily market themselves as women's health. It's harder to see who the acquirers are, when do they acquire and for what value? So I think that's why you see valuations generally lower in investment rounds for women's health, and why when you do see exits, they're at lower value. We just haven't built that ecosystem yet for growth with the major strategics, and as we know, the IPO market right now is not open, so that puts a strain on acquisitions as well. Yeah, I
Holly Scott 8:47
want to come back to the I want Tara's opinion specifically in this area, that strong business case, because at the end of the day, everyone in attending this meeting is interested in elevating healthcare, and most of the individuals that are interested in investing are going to do so if it's a if it's a sound investment, some of the challenge associated with it is getting the right information and communicating the right information. And I know, Tara, you had some pretty interesting thoughts on this in our in our pre call. What are you how do you feel about this particular area?
Tara Ghazi 9:21
Yeah, I think. And also, just continuing on what both Todd and Terry are saying, you know, we need more history built up behind us, right to need more innovation in the space. And a lot, in a lot of ways, I think innovation has reflected society, you know, over a number of decades in which there has not been a lot of space to give voice to a number of women's health needs. It goes beyond labor and delivery, right? There are needs for women's health that span throughout the lifetime. You know, around menopause, you know our focus, which is in breast cancer imaging, which primarily is affecting women between 40 and 80 years old. So this is a different stage of life as society. Has changed, and there's been momentum in validating women, expressing their needs. And I think to Todd's point, complaining more, really demanding more. You know, there are going to be increased markets available, increased innovation that's able to be generated in the space. And I think the valuation will follow, right? The investment opportunity will follow.
Holly Scott 10:21
It's a very important point. And coming back to Terry on this, because, again, the business case is so valuable to everyone here. What is that, in terms of the business case and the data that that you see as a big opportunity for for companies focused in the health of women. How can they bring that to you in a in a better packaged form, that's that's better, easier to digest and more engaging? I
Terri Burke 10:50
think an important part of this story for me is always that value proposition, what? What are you trying to solve for? What's different? And I think when you can educate investors about what a problem is. So for example, in labor and delivery, detecting fetal distress has the accuracy of a coin toss, right? That is interesting, right? It catches people's attention. So rather than leading with, you know, we focus on women, it's talk about what the disease state is and why it's not being treated well, explain that first, I think, gather some interest from the folks you're listening to, and really build out that case for why your product or your technology can make a difference. Because we know women are under diagnosed. So there's a market opportunity right there, if you can bring more patients into the pool and receive treatment. So think about your data in the market. Who's under diagnosed? When do they get diagnosed? Oftentimes, if you think about heart disease, or you think about value, valvular disease, women are diagnosed later, so they're more severe, so the consequences for those patients are more dire. So being able to explain really what's happening, I think becomes critically important. I'm also a marketer at heart, so I think about those things first, but then you have to have the solid business case. You have to be able to explain how you'll grow your business, where that potential exit will come from, and why you're confident in it. And so that's not different than other disease states, but I think in women's health, sometimes just saying, well, we focus on women and we focus on women's health gets lost in the noise. It's better to have that strong value proposition and case for why you're a viable business and why there is a good financial reason for investment
Holly Scott 12:42
and to stay on that point, because there's two, two aspects of that, that's that's what's being said about the business proposition, and it's also who's saying it. So again, going back to data, male led founders have historically focused and raised more money in women's health technologies than even Female Okay, so what are we doing wrong? Yeah,
Terri Burke 13:06
I mean, I'll take a stab at it, and I'm curious what the rest of the panel thinks. You know, I think from a VC perspective, I don't think we as VCs consciously don't want to invest in women's health. I think it's about networking. It's about all the things we always talk about. You know, do you have relationships with investors? Do you have credibility? Do you have a great background? And how can you speak about, again, the business case? And I think we have to do more as investors to open the doors and listen. There's a lot of change. I think that is in the venture community, there's a lot more women than there have been. We've seen a rise in women led funds, women funds that are focused on women CEOs. There can obviously be more. But I would say if you're out there fundraising, don't just stick to those groups like really put your story out there. It's hard work. You have to really pound the pavement. You have to be willing to go back and talk about progress you've made and build a relationship. And that's not different than other disease states. But I think amrischi said this earlier, like it's just an area where the ecosystem isn't as built up, so people aren't as familiar with the statistics and the data around how diseases impact women. So that's a real opportunity to educate.
Tara Ghazi 14:25
I'd like to latch on to the relationship, relationship building aspect of that, because it's a two way street, right? And so you can have a female founder interested in seeking to form relationships, really articulating the business case. But it's absolutely critical on the investment side, that people perhaps take a step outside of their own identity, if it's predominantly male, if they don't identify with that person. And you know, every investor is taking a bit of a risk, right? And it's about de risking the opportunity as much as possible, taking that step, it's really critical to find ways to connect with this person. Take that leap of faith and to step across perhaps gender boundaries in order to do that,
Holly Scott 15:05
that's a huge point in the venture community, because, of course, it's been predominantly a male dominated industry for many, many years, and it's also one that has a high, low turnover. So to change in what are mainly small firms, the dynamic in thinking and encourage diversity of thought, that's a challenge, but there are programs that are doing it well, and we do have more funds now that are fully dedicated women operated, femtech centric, than we ever have before. So we do have some tailwinds in this space. Todd, I'm interested in your perspective, especially coming from large strategics. I can speak from knowing you personally and business wise, over the years, you have always come to the table as a professional that has held diversity of thought as a top priority, and it more so than many coming from from a small startup or large strategic and I'm curious on how what would you recommend as we think about this topic, to encourage more of that in building teams,
Todd Usen 16:14
before coming to women's health, I just believe in looking at The best talent and 53% or 52% of our population. Is women. So to see the best talent you have to get rid of your unconscious bias, which we all have when you're recruiting into any organization. And you do, I hire people that look like me, medical device I've been in a long time. It's a good old boys network. I mean, back in the day, when I was a sales rep, I can't tell you how many deals I close sitting in the locker room getting my scrubs on next to a surgeon. That's wrong. I mean, in a way, you know, that's an unfair advantage, but at the end of the day, so over the years, I realized there's just so much talent out there, and don't miss it. So I really avoided my unconscious bias, and now my maybe, I think my unconscious bias is diversity first, and I'm probably looking the other way. But I can't tell you how many great leaders that I found, but the rules of engagement is when I would speak to you or speak to you, or this is what I need. Here's a position we're looking for. I need diverse pool of candidates, or I'm not going to start. Then we'll hire the best man, woman, white, black, orange, yellow, whatever that is. But you have to see a diverse pool before you can hire it, and then you have to give people the chance to go lead. And so I think that's a that's an opportunity and to last story, and I don't mean to hog any time, when I was interviewing for this position, I was recruited to talk about Minerva surgical, a publicly traded women's health company, as a CEO, and the first thing I said to the board was, if I get this role, I have to be, or hope I am, so much better than anyone else you're interviewing, because when I look at your board structure or your leadership structure, The company's tone deaf, and this should be a job for a woman, and that's why I actually got the job. Because I said your track record is we see what you've promoted and elevated people that are CEOs and CEOs now that are women and men. Because I just think it's they're a little blind and but I just believe in it's not a it's not because I'm trying to get some medals. It's just women led companies are more successful than men. So if I surround myself with these smart people, I look like a better
Holly Scott 18:31
leader. The data does support that diversity and perform high performance. Teams perform better, have better outcomes. There's so many studies that show that it's good business practice. It's not just the right thing to do, it's good business practice. So elevating this discussion is step one. Amrish, you had a really interesting point that I'd love to have you share a bit more about your global experience and some of the best practices you've taken with you and what we might benefit from how others are doing it, in terms of getting advocacy behind them and moving forward, yeah,
Amrish Nair 19:06
and I think, I think that's where we can shed a little bit more, you know, the fact that we didn't start in the US, right? We started from Singapore, Australia, UK, and coming into the US. And, you know, as much as we talk about diversity, we look at diversity of thought across the world, not just within the US, and look at best practices. And we have to look at what the UK and Australia have done well. I mean, they've done a lot of things poorly, but they've done a lot of things well, and that one of those areas is including women as stakeholders in decisions. The point of having patient advocacy as a key stakeholder in policy making. I think that's something that needs to happen, right? And you know, in the UK you have Tommy's and Australia silver Foundation, where women are actively engaged with these foundations and institutions. They know the programs and the hospitals actively promote these programs as well. So I think it ties a little bit. It of what everyone said. You know, Terry mentioned, know the problem statements. These guys know the problem statements because they've funded the population studies which have identified those statements clearly, what leads to poor outcomes, what leads to poor patient experience. And then they can push those into the hospital, and that's where innovation can breed, because we know the problem statements. Clearly, Tommy's in the UK is a stillbirth Foundation which has defined these so clearly to a point where they know what interventions are needed. And hence technologies can build around that. And so even looking at here, I mean, the scale is entirely different. Here, looking at the March of Dimes, how many women have actually can identify a program run by the March of Dimes, they do such phenomenal work. But how many women can actually identify a program run by the March of Dimes that affects them? And it likely there is a program likely run by some patient advocacy group that affects everyone in this room, and so you know, how we engaging with those parties? And I think Women's Health stands uniquely in the space of healthcare, perhaps with mental health, where patient advocacy can really drive change. And I think that's something that we're seeing around the world, that, you know, we looking at how the United States can learn from
Terri Burke 21:18
you. I would just add, you know, I think that advocacy piece is so important in raising the collective voice and knowledge in the marketplace. But you know, again, if you think about the business, so between the ages of 19 and 54 healthcare spend, spending in the US is twice that for women that it is for men. So it's about, I think, bringing those points to the forefront of the conversation and speaking the language that your investors will care about. So it's not only talking about that value statement, the problem statement, understanding what you're doing, but why should people care? And they should care because we're spending a lot more money on women, and then later in life, we're diagnosing women later with really critical illnesses. So over half of strokes are women at an older age. And you think about heart disease, and you think about COPD, that it impacts women differently. So we have to be able to tie what we know is really good medicine and really good technology to the business side. But
Todd Usen 22:20
in and with that, it's, I think it's really important to keep in mind, there's only one surgeon I believe, that a patient sees as their regular doctor, and that's a GYN. You don't go to your orthopedic every year. If you don't need a surgery, you don't go to your neurosurgeon, hopefully ever. But you know what I mean. So, so it's a little different. So the whole marketing strategy is completely different. Direct to consumer is completely different. And but when a man says these things, like, we were doing a direct to consumer, when I started and I said, That's the silliest thing I ever heard, like, Oh no, it really works. I hired a really strong woman as a CCO. So that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard because my GYN delivered both of my children and whatever product he tells me he's using on me, I'm listening. So it's a different strategy, and you just but and so you just have to make sure the right voices are sharing the messaging. And I'm fine with that, and that's important, but we do have to realize it's a different customer than every other surgeon in the world. So investors have to realize that too, you're not just going to switch because this doctor over here switch this doctor because they're doing the special technology and and a woman's going to say, Oh, I'm leaving my doctor and I'm going to go to the physician locator and go to this doctor. I assume that's not normal, and that doesn't happen. And we just have to be aware of that when we're marketing.
Holly Scott 23:38
And that's that's again, comes back to changing the discussion and the narrative and making sure that we're having the right conversations in this forum. And it starts with look. It starts with the individual we are seeing, fortunately, again, a great tailwind of women openly communicating about problems that were embarrassing or shelved for many, many years. So we're seeing open conversations. We're seeing women be more assertive about their health. They're taking more control. They've looked they that we know that they they make 90% of the healthcare decisions for the household, so they have a voice and exercising it is important. However, as a recruiter, and I've been in the industry for three decades. If I have two individuals that share with me a search there, the female will fall to telling me of the 10 things she doesn't have two of them, so she probably isn't qualified. And I have the male individual, he'll say he'll have three things and tell me he's qualified. So there's still a narrative there that starts with the individual, and there's still mentorship, coaching and training highly, highly needed in order to lift this individual to the greater to the greater side population. So we appreciate these discussions along those lines. As a Tara, I want to ask as a. Co founder and and as you've made moves in with your grants, and what have been some of your experiences, especially as an individual, first time, have you had mentors, coaching, any support along the way?
Tara Ghazi 25:17
You know, so touching on the first point about it, our company's been incredibly successful with non diluted funding, and that actually, we can take that back to patient advocacy, right? And there's been a lot of attention, thankfully, in government, legislative action that's really focused a lot on women's health. So at the federal level, there is value in funding, especially in solving the need case that we are after, which is improved breast cancer imaging for the half of the female population almost that have what's described as dense breasts. The standard of care just doesn't serve this population. And there's incredible need for innovation in this space. And if it weren't for federal funds, you know, our company wouldn't have made it for these past, you know, five years, really, to get to the point that we're at right now. It's just been, it's been critical, you know, we need to continue to do that in multiple avenues, right? So and investors, especially seed stage and early stage, right? Being able to value women's health, look at that value proposition and take the leap and see kind of the potential of where it's going is pretty
Holly Scott 26:21
critical. How did you get into those conversations? How did you how did you broker those first investor conversations with NIH was it was, were you shepherded by someone who'd done it before?
Tara Ghazi 26:31
So thankfully, these programs, actually, I they encourage you to find mentors and advisors, but they know that's not always possible, right? That's, again, selective. You need to be somewhat fortunate to find a pretty good advisor. So a change that these programs have implemented as they actually build in coaching programs themselves. If you have a compelling enough technology solution, have a need case that's there, they provide training, coaching, and they work when you're actually in the funding to do it. So it's a pretty heavy bar to get over the hurdle of actually getting in the door with funding, incredibly competitive. So we're really proud of the company. We've had a number of successes in this space, and then they foster you. They foster you
Holly Scott 27:14
from the venture side. Terry, are you seeing more momentum around, really, the mentorship and development within portfolio companies that may need it, especially on underutilized areas like women's health. I
Terri Burke 27:29
don't know that it's specific to women's health. We had a great panel yesterday where we talked about, do you mentor CEOs and how do you do that? How does the board get engaged? I do think there's our ecosystem has expanded so much right to support entrepreneurs. So we have incubators, and we have competitive programs where you get that level of mentorship, whether it's med tech innovator, for example, or we have medtech color. We have medtech women. We have organizations where you can fortunately, meet people, network, engage, get advice, conferences like these, where you can interact, and we're having this conversation about how to do that. So I don't know if I see it specifically at the venture level. I think there's generally more awareness that CEOs need more guidance and coaching in general. But I think our ecosystem has really expanded to be a lot more supportive of the innovation.
Holly Scott 28:27
Yeah, well, we're in it. We're in generally, we're in a great place in terms of where we're at. The government tailwind here is huge. We all may be aware, in November, the Biden administration enacted the Women's Health Initiative on women's health research. There's a substantial backing there, with 100 million already set up and follow up to Congress of 12 billion, and that's to follow these gender gaps, because at the end of the day, some of the largest fundraising fundraising rounds over the last few years have been White House or women's health unicorns, kind body Maven Tia, these were enormous deals, and female founders and female CEOs of women's health companies are raising more money per deal for the first time, where in prior years, as discussed, it was, it was primarily the men. So we do have some great tailwinds. Continuing to advance communication is key across both individual company, clinical industry everywhere. So as we think about this, what are our calls to action here today and Amrit, I'd love to start with you and how we can change this narrative. I
Amrish Nair 29:34
think it's articulating value and building and building whatever you have towards that value. And it's how do we build data so that we address these problems of undervalued companies, of undervalued space, and I think there are multiple stakeholders that need to work together. So I think the call to action here is who else is in your space, and how do you work together to build that? Because it can't be one. Company alone in each individual vertical in women's health, it can't be solo efforts in this case. And so the call to action here for me would be look at people around you who else is trying to solve the problem, and how do we solve the problem together? Because the collective voice is important here. And you know, like Terry was saying, you know, how do you build a business case? It's showing that there is data and a community around it, right? And so, yeah, that for me, it's find people in your space work together, and let's build that value.
Todd Usen 30:32
I think, I think the market has changed significantly in investment. So I use the only the example of coming to Minerva. I mentioned before, Minerva is a publicly traded company, and went public in 2020 on an IPO. I came in january 23 so prior, because they couldn't raise money and they couldn't sell and for whatever reason, and it's not that there was wasn't a lot of skill in the company, so we did an IPO for the wrong reasons. We've taken the company back private. So, you know, it's nice I don't have to sit in any more earnings calls to tell everybody that we have a lot of work to do and clean up. But the market's different now that with the capital funding, I don't think it's necessarily limited, I just think it's more focused. So I truly believe the best companies are actually going to continue to get funded, and you'll find out real quick. If you don't get funded, it is the value and it's the value proposition, man or woman. And I think in the past, when maybe companies, it wasn't a SPAC, but went to SPAC or IPS, they needed money. It's a dangerous thing to do, to just take money like that. If you have a good story and you really have a solution that solves a problem, versus a solution looking for a problem, you're going to get funded?
Tara Ghazi 31:46
Tara, yes, I want to think about what actually influences value a lot for those of us who are medical device companies, where our primary customer may be the clinician or the hospital, and their decisions, in a large part, are going to be driven by reimbursement and payers, and payers may have a bit of an inherent bias against innovation and change, and so I think if there's a call to action, it's for individuals who are in that space to open up a bit more and look at the innovations that are coming out and make sure that they're actually paying and reimbursing, you know, on on par with what the needs are in the patient population. And looking at the diversity among the patient population, in our case, again, you know, half of women have dense breasts, and really the system serves the half of women that don't have dense breasts, and it's just focused on all women as if they were in that category. So there's real need for change.
Terri Burke 32:38
From my perspective, I think there's a couple things I would say, be more aware of the statistics and the disease state that you're in. You know, how is it impacting black women? How is it impacting women versus men? Really dig deeper there and understand where the disparities or the differences in treatments or differences in outcomes, because you you can be your own best advocate by sharing more information and going deeper and getting beyond the superficial conversation of, oh, this is a women's health need. Well, explain that a little more deeply, because when when you do that and you peel back that onion, you can really find populations that have a need for therapy, where you might have good reimbursement, where there's a pathway to market. So I would say, be your own best advocate. I would say for the men in the room continue to talk about these topics. You know, we need your help. It can't just be women talking about women's health. If you think about urology or BPH or prostate, women talk about that as well in venture so that's a challenge for the men in the room to really continue to elevate the conversation and help women. And maybe one statistic I would share, because I think it is uplifting, is John Norris last night with HSBC, ran some data for me around last year's financings, and there were more financing for women's health companies than there were for men's health, which was encouraging to see in 2023 and there were more new investor led rounds than inside rounds. So the men's health companies had more inside rounds. So I think that data is really important because it shows that good companies, as Todd says, are getting financed. And it's encouraging.
Holly Scott 34:24
It's, it's, it's great to hear, well, that the total addressable market is expected to be almost 70 billion by 2030 so this is, this is again, good business, and it starts with listening, listening for the right information. Todd, you made a great point about the market being perceived as litigious, right? But we don't hear about the momentous robot that did the first gynecological surgery. We don't elevate the conversations around these White House or the Women's Health unicorns that have really done so well keeping the. Your ear to where these big market trends are going to take us as an individual and as a business could really help and we we certainly need to be prepared to mentor and train and bring on other advocates at the individual level and in the venture community. Any ideas on how to best do that, any suggestions as we as we look at our last comments here?
Terri Burke 35:30
Well, I would say the fact that we're here at this meeting with LSI, and they've supported this type of topic here, I think is really critical, and I think we need to do more of that. I can't think of a meeting like this, where we have so many diverse companies and investors and service providers, where we're really having an open dialog about what is women's health and how do we change the narrative? And I think that's really important. So that's one area where I think we can continue to expand. I think it matters.
Tara Ghazi 36:01
I think going back to Todd, your story earlier about trying to increase diversity in the team and throughout, I think that's really critical at all levels, ensuring that there's representation. So as an innovator, and especially as a an early stage company, having that diversity and representation at all levels of the team, really, not just from leadership and engineering as well, is just absolutely critical. And so finding talent, encouraging talent, you know, giving people opportunities at all of those levels matters.
Todd Usen 36:33
So if I told everyone in the room that I have a company that's focused on tissue preservation, organ preservation, we'd be okay. Cancer identification, detection and treatment. Cool. Now, if I said it's for the ovaries, it's for the cervix and it's for the breast, why isn't it still cool? So I think we have to maybe start thinking, not maybe even the women's health. You're doing an amazing thing on breast cancer awareness. There's ovarian you know what? Maybe we have to focus in on the disease, because Women's Health is we've made we're making decisions, do we focus north or south of the equator right now? We're south of the equator, right so we're not touching in breast health right now. But you have to make those decisions as a company, so we really a woman's health company, or are we focused on abnormal uterine bleeding, uterine health, Cervical Health, ovarian health, and working on that. So I think maybe we need to be a little more descriptive and talk about the problems that are being faced. Because think about it again, tissue preservation, organ preservation, cancer detection and treatment. Well, it's pretty cool. I'm looking, I'm listening,
Holly Scott 37:40
and amrush. As you, as you share some statements, I want to share the audience something you shared with me before this that I thought was really interesting and ties nicely into it. You actually pivoted from a cardiovascular focused company to a women's health company. So either brilliant or crazy or both, right?
Amrish Nair 38:00
I'm the fool, and friends, family and kids, right? So, but it's, it was really about the passion in the team, right? And I think that that's something that characterizes every women's health company I've seen. It's what drives us day to day. And, you know, detecting arrhythmias just didn't get me out of bed anymore then. So, you know, it was really about, how do you find that within you, right to keep the energy and keep going? And I think, you know, we started off very broad, you know, started off in monitoring, you know, like we didn't know what the hell we're doing. And someone pulled me aside and said, just solve for one issue, right? Just solve for one problem and then work on it from there. And, you know, it's, it's blossomed into, is, was such great advice, and it's blossomed into the fact that we focused on pregnancy, but now we can see the other areas. For example, you know, cardiovascular risk in pregnancy, diabetes risk, and we can see all these things in the impact in the first nine months, the next nine years, because of the fact that we were able to focus, we will take one technology and do one thing with it. So, yeah, that's, that's, that's the story, yeah.
Holly Scott 39:08
Well, thank you all. This has been great. I know we're wrapping on time. Any last comments, we're good. Okay, any questions from the audience? Think we have a minute or two. All right well. Thank you very much for your time. Applause.
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