Katie is the Founder & CEO of Viv for your V. Katie grew up in Tampa, Florida with a big Egyptian-American family. She graduated from Boston College where she studied Marketing and Managing Social Impact. Katie combined her passion for women empowerment and sustainability to create Viv for your V. Katie’s experiences in marketing, creative strategy, and nonprofit work have shaped her to build this mission-driven brand. Both Katie & Viv for your V have been featured in Forbes, Her Campus,...
Mar 29, 2021•47 min
Celeste Mergens is the founder and CEO of Days for Girls International, an award-winning NGO that works to shatter stigma and limitations associated with menstruation for improved health, education and livelihood outcomes. To date, Days for Girls has reached more than 2.1 million women and girls in 144 countries on 6 continents with quality, sustainable menstrual care solutions and health education. Celeste is a sought-after speaker who has been featured in Oprah’s O Magazine and Forbes, among o...
Mar 25, 2021•53 min
Kristy Goodman is the Co-founder and CEO of PreConception Inc, an online service that provides consumer-driven preconception testing for women planning a pregnancy. Kristy earned a Bachelor of Science in Exercise Science with a minor in Health and Wellness from the University at Buffalo and completed a dual-degree program at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey where she earned a Master of Science in PA Studies and a Master of Public Health in Health Education and Behavioral Sc...
Mar 23, 2021•39 min
Teneha Brown is the CEO & Founder of VagiPlug, a woman’s protective plug that assists with the reduction of vaginal infections associated with perfumed bathing soaps. As a Chemistry Pre-Med student at Xavier University, health-related issues have always been of interest to Teneha especially feminine-related health issues as they are understudied, underfunded, and sometimes misunderstood. Teneha holds a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Xavier University. Check out Vagiplug at www.vagiplu...
Mar 19, 2021•43 min
Maryon Stewart is the author of "Manage Your Menopause Naturally" and 27 other books. A world-renowned healthcare expert, she has helped tens of thousands of women around the world overcome PMS and menopause symptoms without using drugs or hormones. In 2018 she was awarded the British Empire Medal and was recognized as one of the 50 most inspirational women by the Daily Mail. We discussed, natural solutions for PMS, managing menopause symptoms and more. Check out Maryon's book, Manage Your Menop...
Mar 15, 2021•40 min
Debra Bass is a growth-oriented business and team leader who has built iconic brands at some of the world’s most admired Fortune 50 companies. Debra is currently President of the United States and Global CMO at Nuvo Group, an emerging leader in maternal-fetal health with a bold ambition to reinvent pregnancy care for the 21st century with new technology, tools, and practices that give every life a better beginning. Before joining Nuvo, Debra spent 15 years at Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Comp...
Mar 15, 2021•33 min
Yvonne Lin is a designer and an expert at considering gender in developing compelling and functional solutions to complex design problems. She was named a Master of Design by Fast Company. Yvonne is a founder of 4B Collective and the Femme Den. She has designed numerous award-winning and best-selling products and services for clients such as Nike, Under Armour, Lego, Hasbro, UNICEF, Proctor & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson, PepsiCo, Nissan, and American Express. She is the inventor of more th...
Mar 10, 2021•45 min
Michel Alvarez is the Founder & CEO of Alvalux Medical SA and its USA spinout CicaLux Inc, an award-winning wearable for post-surgery scar therapy. Michel has 24 years of medical device industry experience in North America and Europe leading international teams, raising capital, and developing innovative medical devices from concept to market. His prior startup roles include: Founder & CEO of iSTAR Medical; co-Founder, CEO & Chairman of Healionics; and co-Founder & Director Gener...
Mar 04, 2021•50 min
Kim Palmer is the CEO and Founder of the hypnotherapy app Clementine, which aims to improve the emotional wellbeing of women all over the world. Born after Kim experienced a number of panic attacks whilst pregnant, Clementine has been created to make women feel calmer, more confident, and better equipped to cope with everyday life. The hypnotherapy sessions available on the Clementine app can be used to boost confidence or help you return to sleep by guiding you to a relaxed state, similar to da...
Mar 01, 2021•50 min
Celina Gorre is the CEO of WomenHeart: the National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease. WomenHeart’s mission is to improve the health and quality of life of women living with or at risk of heart disease and to advocate for their benefit. Prior to WomenHeart, Celina served as executive director of the Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases (GACD). In that role, she led the GACD Secretariat team based in London. She was also the managing director of the Foundation for the United Nations Global C...
Mar 01, 2021•51 min
Amanda French is the Co-Founder and CEO of Emme, a contraception company home to the Emme Smart Case system that automatically tracks when a user takes their pill and reminds them when you don't, so they can live stress-free. Amanda has over a decade of experience bringing innovative products to the market with a focus on women’s health, including a product that facilitated the distribution of antiretrovirals to mothers in the developing world which was recognized by Hilary Clinton and won USAID...
Feb 24, 2021•56 min
Allison Kasirer is the Founder and CEO of Robyn, a company on a mission to make maternal wellness and education accessible to all. Today, Robyn is a digital platform for aspiring, expecting, and new parents featuring 200+ meticulously selected providers across specialized fields including acupuncture, nutrition, lactation, mental and physical health and personal coaching. Robyn has also launched Parentbirth™, a modern and inclusive virtual childbirth education class featuring real stories and pa...
Feb 22, 2021•49 min
Dr. Olivia Ahn is the CEO and co-founder of Planera. Her indignation at the current femcare industry and a recent eco-convert makes for a good co-founder and a bad dinner guest. Olivia founded Planera as a result of mounting frustration with companies forcing the burden of waste onto us as individuals. She believes that a well-designed product should be intuitively simple to use and to dispose in a sustainable manner. Here, the flushable and biodegradable sanitary pad was born and three years of...
Feb 19, 2021•57 min
Dr. Jane van Dis, MD, is an Ob Hospitalist, Medical Director at MavenClinic, Co-Founder of Equity Quotient, Co-Founder of OB Best Practice in partnership with OBGProject, and a Co-Founder of TIME'S UP Healthcare. Dr van Dis also co-admins the non-profit OB Mom Group – a group of 4800+ women ObGyns. She is a national expert and speaker on equity in healthcare, as well, she currently advises 4 health care startups and was recently selected to serve as a medical advisor to Europe’s first FemTech ac...
Feb 16, 2021•40 min
Mitchella Gilbert is the Founder & CEO of OYA Apparel, a FemTech apparel company on a mission to create technical clothes that support women’s health. OYA, aims to provide give all women more control over their health and create safe spaces to discuss feminine care. Based out of UCLA and born in a fashion lab, OYA engineers for women’s health, style, functionality, and comfort. Think: breathable, silky, leak absorbent, and curve shaping. Mitchella earned her Bachelor of Arts in Public Policy...
Feb 10, 2021•54 min
Quinn Edgecomb is a the Founder and CEO of Cali Balance, Inc. and leads a team who are developing CALI to alleviate the burdens of life with Benign Proximal Positional Vertigo (BPPV, commonly referred to as vertigo). Cali is a human centered designed product enabling people to perform vertigo alleviating maneuvers effectively, independently, and accurately. Outside of Cali Balance, she also works at Brochsteins, where she program machines to turn creative designs into real woodworking products a...
Feb 08, 2021•42 min
Dr. Jerrica Kirkley is the Co-founder and Chief Medical Officer of Plume. She's also a mom, physician, trans woman, educator, fierce social justice advocate and lover of all things athletics and the outdoors. She started Plume, the first health technology company dedicated to the transgender community, to radically redefine the way healthcare is delivered and to ensure that every trans person in the US has access to gender-affirming care at the convenience of a smart phone. She has provided trai...
Feb 03, 2021•53 min
Sateria Venable is a patient advocate who was diagnosed with fibroids at the age of 26. After receiving the recommendation of a hysterectomy in her 20s, she was prompted to explore other options to manage her fibroid diagnosis. She began a quest for information, which led her to found The Fibroid Foundation. The Fibroid Foundation is a non-profit taking a multi-faceted approach to Fibroid education. By developing a collaborative partnership with fellow patients and healthcare providers, they are...
Feb 01, 2021•42 min
Lilly Sparks is the Co-Founder and COO of Afterglow, a porn company centered around female pleasure and the unabashed enjoyment of sex. Afterglow merges adult media and sexual wellness. Their mission is to create a comfortable home for pleasure on the internet and to cultivate the unabashed enjoyment of sex. Lilly is a serial entrepreneur who's grown 4 early-stage companies to millions of revenue. She saw a huge untapped opportunity in women's sexual wellness and decided to create afterglow and ...
Jan 27, 2021•47 min
Aagya Mathur is the Co-Founder & CEO of Aavia, a smart pill case and app that learns and improves pill-taking habits. The Aavia smart pill case knows when a user takes their pill and sends reminders to your app if it hasn't been taken your pill and will keep sending reminders until it's actually taken. The app automatically records what time a user takes the pill so they can visualize how they are managing their birth control pills over time. They are also regularly rolling out new features ...
Jan 25, 2021•47 min
Cindy Gallop is the Founder & CEO of Make Love Not Porn, the world's 1st user-generated, human-curated social sex video sharing platform. Cindy has a significant reputation as a highly compelling and inspirational speaker at events and conferences all around the world. Cindy’s 30 years of experience in brand building, marketing and entrepreneurialism, combined with a razor-sharp analytical mind, wide-ranging business experience, future-forward approach to technology, a compellingly charismat...
Jan 20, 2021•41 min
Kristen Carbone is the Founder of Brilliantly, a company improving the lives to women that have been impacted by breast cancer. Brilliantly recently launched Brilliantly Warm, their first wearable designed for women who have had implant reconstruction after a mastectomy and feel constantly cold. Prior to Brilliantly, Kristen spent ten years working in the curatorial departments of museums throughout New York and New England, founded an artists' advocacy business and acted as the project manager ...
Jan 19, 2021•42 min
Blythe Karow is the Co-Founder, President and CEO of Evren Technologies. They are working to advance the treatment of PTSD and other related issues through discreet, wearable products that fit into the user's daily life. They developed Phoenix, an earbud device that will be used to reduce symptoms of long-term PTSD, speed recovery from traumatic events, and improve quality of life by delivering tVNS therapy that responds to your own body’s signals. Blythe has over 20 years of experience in medic...
Jan 13, 2021•48 min
Dr. Gabriela Gutiérrez is the founder, CEO & CSO of Microgenesis, a biotech company helping women discover the causes behind their fertility problems and recover to their full potential in order to get pregnant. Dr. Gutiérrez is a scientific researcher and molecular biologist by training and spent 15 years working on complex fertility cases globally with a main focus on Latin America and Spain. She holds a PhD in medicine from the University of Buenos Aires. We discussed the impact of microb...
Jan 11, 2021•41 min
Evi Heilbrunn is the CEO of Privy, the first, women-led, feminine care company developing innovative and clinically proven solutions for women’s health issues ranging from bladder leaks to UTIs and yeast infections. The company was founded to bring to market the Finess softpatch, the first FDA-cleared, over-the-counter product that prevents light to moderate bladder leaks before they happen. Evi is a digital health leader and investor in FemTech. She has a proven track record of scaling early-st...
Jan 06, 2021•51 min
Ida Tin is the co-founder and CEO of Clue, a mobile app that enables women and people with menstrual cycles to make good choices for themselves and live full lives not in spite of their biology but in tune with it. The app’s mission is to help people all around the world benefit from insights into female health. Ida is credited with coining the term "femtech". She was a speaker at prestigious conferences such as TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco, LeWeb in Paris, Slush in Finland and many more....
Jan 04, 2021•39 min
Since starting the podcast in early 2020, the listenership and FemTech Focus community has grown so much since then. In this episode, Dr. Brittany Barreto discusses the year in review from our successes to new discoveries. Check out FemTech Focus at www.femtechfocus.org Rate, Review & Subscribe!
Jan 01, 2021•1 hr 5 min
Cindy Gu is a feminine energy coach with a mission to elevate femininity as a source of power by helping high-impact women in tech create 5D success with inner alignment, abundance, and freedom, without compromising lifestyle goals to thrive in work and life. She was the previous founder of VITALI Wear, a bra startup founded with the mission to bring daily improvement to people's lives and make personalized health fashionable which has appeared on Mashable, VentureBeat, Engadget, Cosmopolitan an...
Dec 30, 2020•47 min
Gail Anderson is a Harvard-trained counselor with over 20 years of experience helping intended parents, and one of the fertility industry’s leading innovators and creative thinkers. After doing postgraduate research at Yale, she started two egg donor agencies, became the executive director of one of the top surrogacy programs in the United States, and founded Donor Concierge. Gail is a past Executive Director of the Society for Ethics in Egg Donation & Surrogacy. Tulip Fertility is a do-it-y...
Dec 28, 2020•37 min
Claire Rosario is the User Experience & IT Infrastructure consultant at Hyivy Health, a rehabilitation company developing products to improve pelvic health for womxn and vaginas everywhere. She has worked in IT infrastructure for over a decade with clients and employers in various fields, including the financial, fashion, and non-profit sectors. A self-proclaimed “vagina hacker,” Claire contributes her expertise in engineering, network security, data compliance, and quality assurance to the ...
Dec 23, 2020•1 hr 5 min
