WHAM (Women’s Health Access Matters) has launched the Innovator’s Circle, a new initiative aimed at bringing early-stage investors together to accelerate innovation in women’s health. In a bid to improve funding for women’s health startups, the Innovator’s Circle brings together 20 founding funds specifically targeting women’s health investments. 

Despite women comprising half of the global population and being key decision-makers in healthcare, companies focusing on women’s health still receive a mere 2% of healthcare venture capital funding. To tackle this disparity, the collaborative network is set to identify groundbreaking technologies, shape investment strategies, and create stronger funding pathways for promising startups in the sector.

“The Innovator’s Circle is more than a network- it’s a platform to accelerate groundbreaking ideas into market-ready solutions,” explained Carolee Lee, CEO and Founder of WHAM. “By aligning early-stage investors with later-stage capital partners, we’re unlocking exponential opportunity for returns- and real health impact.”

Building a cohesive investment network

The Innovator’s Circle forms a key part of WHAM’s broader strategy to transform the women’s health landscape. It complements WHAM’s Investment Collaborative, which was launched in December 2024 to bring together multi-billion-dollar funds focused on later-stage investments.

Naseem Sayani, recently appointed Director of the Innovator’s Circle and also an Operating Advisor at How Women Invest and Advisor at Tower Capital, highlighted the importance of early-stage investors in driving innovation. “This is the pipeline engine,” she explained. “We’re organising the earlier segment of the investment ecosystem to effectively curate the funnel and ensure appropriate attention on innovations at the earliest stages, so there are strong companies ready for later-stage investment.”

By pooling funds that invest from seed to Series A, the Innovator’s Circle aims to enhance collaboration among those who are often the first to spot new technologies and approaches. Through knowledge-sharing, trend analysis, and coordinated investment strategies, the network hopes to support companies as they progress from concept to market.

A collaborative approach to investment

The Innovator’s Circle will initially host quarterly virtual calls to bring together its founding members, with plans to establish working groups addressing key challenges and opportunities within the women’s health investment space.

“Our intention is to proactively shape what the ecosystem becomes,” Sayani emphasised. “We want to strategically influence the evolution of women’s health funding at both the fund and company levels, rather than allowing market forces to dictate outcomes. Our goal is to position ourselves at the forefront of these developments.”

This proactive approach is designed to address a long-standing issue where the traditional investment model has consistently underfunded women’s health initiatives. By creating a more coordinated funding environment, WHAM and its partners aim to prevent promising innovations from being overlooked due to gaps between investment stages.

Key Founding Members

The Innovator’s Circle includes several significant players, such as AHA Go Red for Women Venture Fund, Amboy Street Ventures, Avestria, Catalytic Impact Foundation, Coyote Ventures, Cross Border Impact Ventures, Digital DX Ventures, Emmeline Ventures, Foreground Capital, Goddess Gaia Ventures, Kaya Ventures, Kidron Capital, March of Dimes, Next Ventures, NextBlue, Seae Ventures, Swizzle Ventures, The Sparrow Fund, US Fertility, and Zeal.

Initially, the Innovator’s Circle will focus on U.S.-based funds, but there are ambitions to expand internationally as the initiative matures. Sayani expressed confidence that more global partners will join over time.

Addressing Key Challenges

The Innovator’s Circle is tackling several common issues faced by early-stage investors in women’s health. Sayani identified three primary areas of concern.

First, ensuring that companies with high potential secure adequate funding to grow. “We need to ensure that we don’t miss opportunities to support promising technologies and high-potential business models within these companies,” Sayani said.

Secondly, supporting the funds themselves in raising capital. With women’s health emerging as a distinct investment category, many specialised funds are still building their track records and expanding their network of limited partners.

Thirdly, identifying and responding to emerging areas of consumer demand. “There are significant areas of demand emerging within the ecosystem directly from women consumers,” Sayani noted. “We need to assess whether we’re effectively directing capital to meet this demand and whether we’re approaching this strategically as a collective.”

By addressing these challenges through collaboration rather than in isolation, the Innovator’s Circle aims to build a more strategic and efficient funding ecosystem.

Part of a Broader Vision

The Innovator’s Circle forms part of WHAM’s wider innovation ecosystem, which also includes:

• The WHAM Research Collaborative: A global network advancing sex-based research in major disease areas. 
• The WHAM Investment Collaborative: A coalition of leaders from multi-billion-dollar funds aimed at increasing private investment in women’s health companies. 
• The WHAM Life Sciences Collaborative: A group of industry experts working to integrate sex-based biology throughout the product development cycle. 

Together, these initiatives are designed to address gaps in the women’s health innovation pipeline, from research and development to commercialisation.

“There’s substantial opportunity in this sector, and the more effectively we can organise our collective resources and expertise, the greater progress we’ll achieve,” Sayani concluded. “Our approach is fundamentally collaborative and iterative, and we welcome input and participation from all stakeholders in this ecosystem.”

For women’s health startups, often facing fragmented funding despite a vast market potential, the Innovator’s Circle represents a critical step toward building a coordinated, well-resourced investment environment—one that ensures innovative ideas don’t fall through the cracks.