Earlier this week, women’s health got its latest unicorn. Midi Health raised a $100 million series D round that pushed its valuation to $1 billion.
The afternoon before the news was announced, Midi founder Joanna Strober stopped by the Fortune offices to chat about what the news meant. How was she feeling? She was thinking about what’s coming next.
“There’s so much demand,” she told me.
Midi’s funding round was led by Goodwater Capital, which invests in consumer tech like Spotify, Twitter, and newer apps like Beli (and not much health care). Midi’s lead investor reveals where the company is going next; Strober wants to build Midi as a true consumer brand, not a B2B business like so many health care unicorns.
The other major women’s health company to cross a $1 billion valuation is Maven, which sells family care benefits to employers. Midi started as a telehealth service providing menopause care, and is now getting into weight loss and selling its own branded supplements.
Strober argues that it’s less expensive to build a consumer brand than a business that requires B2B infrastructure. And she says it wasn’t possible to build a true national consumer brand in women’s health until the rise of telehealth post-pandemic.
Midi has now raised $250 million in funding. Investors will be looking for a return on that investment; Strober doesn’t specifically say she aims to IPO, but she says she is not interested in selling the company. Her goal is to build Midi into a “really large company.”
“I am actually super optimistic that my doing this will inspire a lot of other women to do that too,” she told me. “It’s really valuable to see other women starting big companies, and it should inspire other people to do it as well.”
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
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