Femtech startup Perelel receives LOOM support from the Sexual Health Founders Fund

Women’s health company Perelel on Wednesday announced that it has acquired women’s health platform LOOM, for an undisclosed amount. LOOM founder Erica Chidi will join Perelel as a strategic advisor.

Chidi co-launched LOOM in 2017 as a hands-on experience, providing educational content for women on reproductive and sexual health education. In 2020, it grew into an online subscription-based digital platform, providing courses, content, and community support for women. It raised a total of $6.5 million from investors like Slow Ventures, and Founders Fund, as well as celebrities like actress Tessa Thompson and Goop founder Gwyneth Paltrow.

“I was the 34th black woman to raise more than a million dollars,” Chidi recalled to TechCrunch, adding that she did not expect to raise nearly $3 million in three months in late 2019. meanwhile, there was a new interest in women’s health.”

Meanwhile, Alex Taylor, Dr. Banafsheh Bayati, and Victoria Thain Gioia launched Perelel in 2020 to provide clinically based vitamins to support women’s hormonal health. The company claims to have increased its product portfolio by 50% year-on-year, it says it has sold more than 48 million tablets since its launch, and its growth has reached more than 120% year-on-year, although it declined to disclose. net worth. It closed a $6 million Series A round led by Unilever in February.

The past few years have seen the topic of women’s health come into socio-political focus, especially since the Supreme Court struck down national access to abortion in the US.

Thain Gioia, co-CEO with Taylor, remembers the previous presentation of Perelel when investors asked them how big the women’s health market for reproduction, pregnancy, and postpartum, believing it was a small opportunity to return. “The good thing today is, at least from the investment community, they’re actually realizing that women’s health is a huge opportunity that we all don’t deserve to face,” she told TechCrunch.

The numbers really show a healthy growth, although all companies in recent years – unless they are AI – still see a problem in the funding area. A 2023 report by Silicon Valley Bank found that there was a 314% increase in business dollars flowing into women’s health companies since 2018 compared to a 28% increase in the health sector as a whole. Billions are coming into this sector: Deloitte found that 2% of the dollars entering the health sector are going to women’s health companies, which will hit 41.2 billion dollars by 2023.

It was only natural then that Perelel and LOOM’s paths would cross and Chidi would find himself at brunch earlier this year with Taylor and Thain Gioia, talking about the next steps for both their companies. Chidi wanted to sell LOOM.

“When we launched our app on the App Store last October, I knew I wanted to move forward and find a company that had superior health intelligence – or superior consumer intelligence – and could use what we’ve built to better support women in the community. more than 360,” said Chidi.

“This type of intentional education and health information and content is unmatched by any other brand in the category,” said Thain Gioia. “It’s exciting to create something very different, but from two existing strong brands.

Perelel says their next steps are to continue their “wider mission to support women and support women’s health.”

LOOM scaled back its team a few months ago and when the acquisition was completed this week, Chidi was the only employee left. He says he is not one for idle hands and, apart from being a consultant for LOOM, he currently works as a consultant for other companies, including Nike. He wrote a book ten years ago and is working on an anniversary edition. “More time to write would be really fun,” she said.