Jenny Button first considered Emm in the course of the COVID lockdown. She was utilizing an Oura ring and the Whoop monitoring band and getting insights about her physique, however there wasn’t a tool that might present knowledge about one of the vital necessary facets — reproductive and menstrual well being.
“It appeared loopy to me, as a result of these are issues that each lady desires to have the ability to observe and higher perceive,” she informed TechCrunch. She thought to herself: Why not make a wearable gadget that may inform somebody extra about their reproductive well being? She penned a letter to one of many engineers at Dyson, made a connection, and began testing the thought.
“5 years later, following 1000’s of designs and iterations and prolonged person testing, we’ve revealed the world’s first good menstrual cup,” mentioned Button.
The UK-based firm has additionally raised a $9 million (£6.8 million) seed spherical, one led by Lunar Ventures because it prepares to formally launch its product subsequent yr.
The product features like a daily menstrual cup — designed to retailer interval blood fairly than take in it. However Emm’s medical-grade silicone is “fitted with ultra-thin, superior sensor expertise.” This sensor gathers knowledge that may assist customers perceive patterns about their cycles. Button hopes that it might “rework the analysis, prognosis and remedy of menstrual and reproductive well being situations.”
She isn’t the one one who thinks this fashion. Different femtech founders informed The Guardian a few months ago that menstrual blood was an “ignored alternative in ladies’s well being” that might provide insights not out there from well being checks primarily based on circulatory blood.
It might, as an illustration, assist diagnose painful and typically misdiagnosed medical situations like endometriosis.
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“One in ten ladies right now suffer from endometriosis,” Button mentioned. “A situation that, like many others in reproductive well being, takes a median of seven to 10 years to diagnose.”
That delay “is largely due to the dearth of significant knowledge and poor characterization of menstrual well being in scientific settings,” Button believes. “There have been no dependable instruments to precisely and objectively observe that side of well being till now.”
Past endometriosis, she added that one in three women experiences “extreme reproductive well being points” all through their lives.
Knowledge gathered from the Emm app is encrypted and saved securely, with two-factor authentication. “It’s additionally all the time anonymized or pseudonymized,” that means private identifiers are eliminated or changed with codes, “and can solely be accessed by the individuals at Emm who genuinely want it,” she mentioned.
Button used the phrase “strategic” to explain her funding spherical and mentioned she linked along with her lead investor via her community. Others within the spherical embody Alumni Ventures (who backed Oura), Alumni Ventures, and BlueLion International. Cash will likely be used to launch the product into the UK market subsequent yr, she mentioned, including that the waitlist has already topped 30,000 pre-orders.
Capital may even be used for analysis and improvement. Button hopes to enter the U.S. market in early 2027.
“Menstrual well being is just the leaping off level for Emm,” mentioned Button. “Finally, I imagine we can have a profound impression on ladies’s well being extra broadly,” she continued, including she hopes to develop the product sooner or later, maybe into prognosis, different digital care instruments, and even therapeutics.
“Our mission is to speed up prognosis, equip individuals with the info to advocate for themselves, and finally assist them take management of their very own our bodies and well being journeys,” she mentioned.
