Jenny Button first considered Emm through 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 would present knowledge about some of the essential facets — reproductive and menstrual well being.  

“It appeared loopy to me, as a result of these are issues that each lady needs to have the ability to observe and higher perceive,” she advised TechCrunch. She thought to herself: Why not make a wearable machine 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 concept.  

“5 years later, following hundreds of designs and iterations and prolonged consumer testing, we’ve revealed the world’s first good menstrual cup,” stated 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 capabilities like an everyday menstrual cup — designed to retailer interval blood moderately than take up 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 may “rework the analysis, prognosis and remedy of menstrual and reproductive well being situations.”  

She isn’t the one one who thinks this manner. Different femtech founders advised The Guardian a couple of months in the past that menstrual blood was an “missed alternative in ladies’s well being” that would provide insights not out there from well being assessments primarily based on circulatory blood. 

It may, as an illustration, assist diagnose painful and usually misdiagnosed medical situations like endometriosis.  

“One in ten ladies right now undergo from endometriosis,” Button stated. “A situation that, like many others in reproductive well being, takes a mean 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 facet of well being till now.” 

Past endometriosis, she added that one in three ladies experiences “extreme reproductive well being points” all through their lives.  

Information 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 folks at Emm who genuinely want it,” she stated. 

Button used the phrase “strategic” to explain her funding spherical and stated she linked along with her lead investor by her community. Others within the spherical embrace Alumni Ventures (who backed Oura), Alumni Ventures, and BlueLion International. Cash will probably be used to launch the product into the UK market subsequent yr, she stated, including that the waitlist has already topped 30,000 pre-orders.  

Capital may even be used for analysis and growth. Button hopes to enter the U.S. market in early 2027.  

“Menstrual well being is barely the leaping off level for Emm,” stated Button. “Finally, I imagine we could have a profound affect on ladies’s well being extra broadly,” she continued, including she hopes to develop the product in the future, maybe into prognosis, different digital care instruments, and even therapeutics.  

“Our mission is to speed up prognosis, equip folks with the information to advocate for themselves, and in the end assist them take management of their very own our bodies and well being journeys,” she stated.