Latest news with #Cofertility
Forbes
16-07-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Two Female Venture Capitalists Bet Big On Women's Health And Sports
Left to right: Muse Capital co-founders Assia Grazioli-Venier and Rachel Springate. From femtech to sports team ownership, two women VCs prove that backing overlooked markets is good business. When Muse Capital co-founders Assia Grazioli-Venier and Rachel Springate launched their firm, they weren't just looking for returns—they were looking to make an impact. With a strong background in business development, entertainment, and technology, the pair built a VC firm focused on women's health and sports, as well as on founders and investors who bring fresh perspectives often ignored by Silicon Valley. Their model is resonating. Muse Capital has invested in companies like Midi, Cofertility, and Eli Health—pioneers in femtech and hormone health—long before women's healthcare innovation became trendy. Now, they've taken that thesis a step further with the acquisition of SailGP Italia, making Muse the first female-led ownership group in the SailGP sailing league, in partnership with Red Bull. Muse Capital isn't just betting on founders. They're betting on culture, community, and women. A VC Firm Built by Operators—And Guided By Purpose Grazioli-Venier and Springate didn't follow the traditional VC track. Instead, they brought decades of experience creating partnerships between startups and Fortune 500s, celebrities, athletes, and influencers—relationships they now activate on behalf of portfolio companies. That operator DNA is Muse Capital's superpower. The firm helped Eli Health land a free Times Square billboard, brought Maria Sharapova on board as a strategic investor in Cofertility, and provided the opportunity to be a part of the Disney accelerator for Flickplay. 'We want to be the most strategic, helpful investor on your cap table,' Springate said. 'We don't just make introductions—we execute.' Their support goes far beyond capital. Lauren Makler, founder of Cofertility, said, 'From day one, Muse Capital has been one of Cofertility's most dedicated champions. Their support of initiatives like our Level the Playing Field campaign is just one example of how they show up—offering thoughtful insight, strategic introductions, and a genuine commitment to our growth.' Muse's thesis spans three investment buckets: care, live, and play. A consortium led in part by Muse Capital's founding partner Grazioli-Venier has acquired the Red Bull Italy SailGP team, marking the first female-led ownership group in the league's history. Through her sports advisory arm, Muse Sport, Grazioli-Venier is steering the team alongside luxury entrepreneur Gian Luca Passi de Preposulo and two-time America's Cup winner Jimmy Spithill. The investor group includes Anne Hathaway, Dr. Jennifer Ashton, and other industry leaders. For Grazioli-Venier, the league's commitment to mixed-gender teams, sustainability, and commercial viability made it a compelling opportunity. Red Bull Italy SailGP sailing past the grandstand of The Rolex SailGP 2025 Championship ITM New ... More Zealand Sail Grand Prix Unlocking Venture Capital By Tapping Wealthy Women Investors While Muse's portfolio focuses on founders, the firm is also helping to redefine who gets to be a funder. Like many female-led VC firms, Muse encountered skepticism from institutions that deemed women's health or menopause a 'niche.' So they turned to their network, which included family offices and high-net-worth individuals—often women—who understood the opportunity. Muse's experience aligns with what How Women (and Men) Invest in Startups,* found: Wealthy women are well-suited to be limited partners (LPs) in venture funds because they are: But they're also relational. Women often want a trusted advisor—a financial planner or fellow woman investor—to validate their investment decisions. A VC plays that role. Irma Wang, managing director at Bridge Ventures, explained why her firm backed Muse: 'We've been very interested in the fund's focus on women's healthcare tech—a space that's been historically overlooked, but that is full of potential and actually helping to fulfill a real need. Muse isn't passive with its portfolio companies; the founders actively help shape outcomes by sharing co-investment opportunities and making high-impact introductions.' Rewriting The Rules Of Venture Capital Funding Despite progress, the venture capital landscape remains profoundly unequal. In 2024, only 2% of U.S. VC funding went to all-female founding teams, and 21.2% to mixed-gender founding teams—down from a high of 24.3% in 2023, according to PitchBook's Female Founders Dashboard. The numbers at the funder level are equally stark: Just 17.3% of decision-makers at U.S. VC firms with at least $50 million in assets under management were women in 2024, according to Pitchbook US All In: Female Founders in the VC Ecosystem.. Muse Capital is part of a new wave of female-led funds working to change that from both sides. Marina Pavlovic Rivas, co-founder and CEO of Eli Health, noted, 'Muse is the rare kind of investor every category-defining founder dreams of. They saw early where the world was headed and developed a bold thesis about how our groundbreaking technology would uniquely shape that future, long before it became evident to most.' In 2017, Muse Capital began testing their thesis—that investors could be strategically hands-on partners—by writing angel checks in women's health startups. Within just 14 months, they saw a couple of early exits—an uncommon outcome at the seed stage. Encouraged by those results, they launched their first venture fund in 2018 and followed with a second in 2022. To support portfolio growth and give LPs additional exposure, they also raised special-purpose vehicles (SPVs) for follow-on rounds. Today, Muse Capital has $52 million in assets under management. Nine of their portfolio companies have exited. Women Reshaping Venture—From VCs To LPs To Founders Muse Capital proves that when you center women's health innovation, back diverse startup founders, and engage female investors, you don't just create impact—you build momentum. The firm is still investing out of its second fund and laying the groundwork for its third, all while continuing to reshape how venture capital views risk, leadership, and opportunity. Whether helping a startup land celebrity backing or reshaping ownership in global sports, Muse Capital is showing what's possible when female VCs lead—and invest—in the future they want to see.
The Guardian
04-03-2025
- Sport
- The Guardian
Athletes on fertility, egg freezing and having it all: ‘I can have it if I want it'
The cold sterility of a gynecologist's office is about as far removed as you can get from a tennis court, a basketball gym, or a bobsled run. The crinkling white paper, the flimsy open-face gown that leaves patients vulnerable and freezing, the intimidating silver instruments laid out neatly on a table – it's hardly an environment that feels empowering. Yet some of the highest highs and lowest lows of women's lives take place in such rooms, just as they do on clay courts, snowy terrain or hardwood floors. It's no small thing that women's peak fertility coincides with their peak athletic performance. It's a cruel twist of fate that just as professional female athletes must begin asking themselves whether they want to have children – and, if so, when and how – they are also focused on pushing their bodies to their limits for as long as possible. As a result, for many women competing at the elite level, family planning gets pushed to the back burner simply because there's nowhere else for it to go. Four-time Olympic medalist Kaillie Humphries admitted in a phone interview, 'There was not a thought about family planning at all' when she first began bobsledding at 17. Elite athletes and Olympians often structure their lives in four-to-12-year increments, dictated by the Olympic cycle. Humphries didn't seriously consider having a baby until she was in her early 30s. Part of that delay stemmed from feeling like she didn't have the option to pursue both career and motherhood. Bobsleigh, in particular, keeps athletes on the road for months at a time. (This October, Humphries and the 2026 Olympic team will head to Europe and won't return until March.) Without female role models in the sport who had successfully balanced elite competition with raising a family, Humphries turned to her male counterparts – many of whom told her outright that it simply wasn't possible to do both. The idea that women can't have it all – or, worse, that they don't have the choice to try – is something that irks tennis legend and former Olympian Maria Sharapova. Though she conceived her son without fertility assistance, Sharapova is a strong advocate for women's autonomy in deciding when and how to have children. To that end, she is an investor in Cofertility, a company offering fertility services such as IVF and egg freezing. The company also allows women to donate half their retrieved eggs in exchange for free fertility treatments. 'As a professional athlete, my body was quite literally my business,' Sharapova told the Guardian via email. Women across industries face similar dilemmas, she noted, and investing in egg freezing was an easy way for her to 'mitigate the strain of the so-called biological clock'. Perhaps, one day, that ticking clock will be nothing more than a relic of the past – a byproduct of an era when women's reproductive choices were dictated by external forces rather than personal autonomy. At least, that's Sharapova's hope. 'When women have the opportunity to navigate their careers on their own terms by freezing their eggs, they unlock more autonomy in all aspects of their lives,' she emphasized. 'They can take the time to find the right partner and start a family when they are financially and emotionally ready.' Autonomy is at the root of nearly every question women ask themselves about having children. But sometimes, timing isn't a matter of choice. Humphries learned this the hard way. Once she decided she was ready for motherhood, she assumed her body would cooperate – just as it had in so many other instances. 'My body has always responded when I needed it to,' she said. 'And I think this was just me being immature. This was me thinking my body was amazing. As an Olympic gold medalist, it's always responded when I needed it to, and I just assumed that when I wanted to have kids, I'd stop using protection and get pregnant right away. And that was not the case – not even close.' Instead, Humphries was diagnosed with stage 4 endometriosis after an MRI revealed a large cyst on her ovary. When she went in to have it removed, doctors discovered that the endometriosis was widespread and had attached to her organs in a way that made surgical removal impossible. With few other options, she and her husband, fellow bobsledder Travis Armbruster, 'went straight to IVF'. Make no mistake: the IVF process is grueling. And because Humphries was attempting to get pregnant while still competing at an Olympic level, she had to carve out the time and energy to stimulate her ovaries, retrieve her eggs, freeze them, thaw them, develop embryos, transfer them back into her womb, and, ultimately, carry a pregnancy to term – all while maintaining her training regimen. Navigating that process also meant having difficult conversations with the United States Bobsled and Skeleton Federation, something she described as 'tough'. Yet, in many ways, Humphries was one of the lucky ones. Her $30,000 annual salary could be put toward IVF cycles. USA Bobsled/Skeleton was supportive of her desire to become a mother. Her coaches trusted that she would be able to return to Olympic shape in time for the next Winter Games. But unlike the WNBA, which reimburses players up to $60,000 for fertility treatments such as egg freezing and IVF, Humphries said Olympic athletes are often left to fend for themselves. She and Armbruster have personally financed their IVF journey, as well as the cost of traveling with their child overseas so that Humphries can continue to compete. Then, there was the matter of her ranking. If any part of her pregnancy or postpartum recovery took too long, she risked losing her standing in the sport and being forced to start over from the bottom – despite her Olympic medals and titles – simply because she chose to have a child. After giving birth, she was given 18 months to return to an elite level; otherwise, she would lose her monthly stipend, insurance and ranking in one fell swoop. Humphries returned to competition just five months postpartum. Both Humphries and Sharapova believe more conversations need to take place between older and younger female athletes. While Sharapova didn't personally feel pressure to have a child before 30, she acknowledged, 'I can easily see and understand how other women could feel that societal pressure. It's no secret that women reach peak fertility between their late teens and late 20s. And even though the idea that women must have children during that time is outdated, it makes sense that age would still be a biological concern.' Humphries echoed that sentiment. 'A lot more conversations need to happen,' she said. 'And I think there needs to be a lot more support for female athletes in general. Because, as I've learned, getting pregnant and starting a family is not always straightforward, and it's not always easy.' 'I think, especially as female athletes and high-performance competitors, there's not enough education or understanding around fertility. I do wish I had frozen my eggs when I was younger… it was a mad scramble when I finally did it. I could have done it at a more convenient time – during an injury, for instance, when I was already physically down.' Athletes in their 20s, she added, are almost never going to prioritize fertility planning over hiring a coach or investing in equipment. 'They're still trying to earn that first gold medal or qualify for the Olympics. They don't have the financial means or the mental bandwidth to say, 'You know what? Let me think about my fertility right now.'' Part of the solution lies with organizations such as national Olympic committees and individual sports federations, which could incorporate family planning into their budgets. But it's also up to veteran athletes to step in and say, 'Learn from me. Take it from me. And now, how can we support the younger generation?' 'I just want everyone to have the option – because I didn't,' Humphries concluded. 'I hope the younger generation realizes, 'You know what? You can have it all. You can be a mom. You can be competitive. You can be the best in the world.' 'Look at Naomi Osaka: there are women coming back to sport and performing as badass moms. I want 20-year-olds to know: If you want it, you can have it.'
Yahoo
05-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Cofertility and &Mother Launch "Level the Playing Field" to Drive Fertility Equality for Women Athletes
New Data Highlights the Need for Reproductive Health Awareness and Proactive Fertility Care in Women's Sports LOS ANGELES, February 05, 2025--(BUSINESS WIRE)--In honor of National Girls & Women in Sports Month this February, Cofertility, the human-centered fertility ecosystem offering a scalable approach to egg freezing and third party reproduction, has partnered with &Mother, the non-profit organization founded to support women in sports and motherhood, to launch Level the Playing Field. This initiative was driven by insights from hundreds of surveyed Olympic, Paralympic and other professional women athletes, shaping new research on the challenges of balancing motherhood with a career in sports. "At Cofertility, we believe that every woman, athletes included, deserves access to education and options when it comes to her reproductive future," said Lauren Makler, Co-Founder and CEO of Cofertility. "Too often, women are forced to choose between their careers and motherhood due to outdated systems that fail to provide institutional support, protective policies, or comprehensive fertility benefits. Many of our own Cofertility members are athletes who have faced these very challenges firsthand. Through Level the Playing Field, in partnership with &Mother, we aim to change the narrative around proactive fertility care in sports and better equip athletes with the knowledge and resources they need to make informed decisions about their future—on their own terms." "In sports, women have been penalized for even choosing motherhood," added Alysia Montaño, President, Founder and CEO of &Mother and Olympic Athlete. "This campaign shines a light on the critical support and resources athletes need to help level the playing field, extending their careers and providing them with psychological safety while supporting their abilities to thrive as mothers. If we can break these barriers in sports, we can set a precedent for all mothers." After speaking with over 350 women athletes, including Olympians and professionals, from over 18 sports, the results are resounding: Women athletes want options. Many aspire to motherhood but face career roadblocks that leave them without the flexibility or resources to plan for their reproductive futures. In fact, 70% of professional women athletes report having delayed family-building due to their career. Women athletes need support. Outdated policies sideline them. 95% feel motherhood negatively impacts their earning potential, and 9 in 10 believe it affects their career longevity due to inadequate family leave and financial instability. Women athletes are underserved. Fertility concerns weigh heavily on them, yet less than half have consulted a medical professional, and 90% feel uneducated about their options. Of those who haven't pursued fertility preservation, 35% cite career limitations, and 65% lack education on the process. Meanwhile, 92% receive no financial or institutional support for fertility care. The Level the Playing Field campaign will unite leading organizations, teams, athletes, and influential voices including Maria Sharapova, Ashlyn Harris, Alexi Pappas, Missy Franklin, Chelsea Sodaro, Carly Patterson, Molly Huddle, and brands like Hello Sunshine, MUSE Capital, Strava, Babylist, ON and more to amplify the message. "As athletes, our bodies are literally our business, so our fertility and reproductive health directly impacts our livelihoods," said Maria Sharapova, former professional and Olympic tennis player, investor and advocate in women's health companies, like Cofertility. "I invested in Cofertility to help make egg freezing more affordable and provide women access to health and family planning options, which is particularly pertinent to women in sports. It's important to me that women athletes have the knowledge and resources necessary to maintain autonomy over their careers and compete at the highest levels for as long as they wish." It's time to level the playing field. To learn more about the campaign, see the survey results, or get involved and donate to the cause, visit or follow Cofertility on Instagram at @freezebyco and &Mother at @andmother_org and the hashtag #leveltheplayingfield. About Cofertility:Cofertility is reshaping fertility preservation and third-party reproduction so it's more accessible, human and community-driven. The company offers a destigmatized, scalable approach to egg donation, which reshapes the cost structure of egg-freezing by matching women who want to freeze their eggs with families who could not otherwise conceive and by donating half, women can freeze their eggs for free. Cofertility is in the "family" business, determined to improve the family-building journey — today or in the future — and is in an endless pursuit to make these experiences more positive. For more information, visit or follow on LinkedIn and Instagram. View source version on Contacts Carly KuikmanCSK Public Relations(978) 604 - 0904carly@ Sign in to access your portfolio
