Ava, the fertility wearable, raises $9.7M to help families conceive

Ava, a medical technology company focused on women’s reproductive health, announced today that it has raised a $9.7 million Series A. The investment was led by European VC firm Polytech Ventures with Blue Ocean Ventures, Global Sources and the company’s existing seed investors Swisscom and ZKB participating. Ava originally launched as part of TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield in September 2015.

Ava’s first product, a fertility tracking bracelet, is a Class One medical device that more accurately identifies a women’s fertile window each month.

The bracelet costs $199 and has been shipping since July. When we last heard from the company, they had just completed their first clinical trial at the University Hospital of Zurich, with 41 participants. The results of the Zurich study show that the Ava device detects an average of 5.3 fertile days per cycle with 89 percent accuracy. Users report there are currently eight “Ava Babies” on the way in 2017.

Outside of normal product development, much of Ava’s funding will be directed at research and additional clinical studies. So far, Ava has presented results on the correlation of temperature and heart rate with the fertility window.

A second trial is already underway, this time with 200 women. Moving forward, the team is looking to publish more detailed results across other factors they track — from hormones like urinary LH and estrogen-3-glucuronide (metabolite of estrogen) to physiological factors including bioimpedance (an approximation for body fat), pulse rate, breathing rate, sleep, movement, heart-rate variability, skin temperature, heat loss and perfusion (the movement of blood from capillaries into tissue).

The company also recently obtained the CE Mark, meaning they can now begin selling across the EU. In early 2017, Ava will be available the U.K., Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

According to co-founder Lea von Bidder, Ava’s broader vision is to work for women across many stages of their lives, whether that’s preventing pregnancy, trying to get pregnant, being pregnant or even menopause.