CURE® SURVEY UNVEILS WHAT INVESTORS LOOK FOR IN FUNDING WOMEN'S HEALTH

Established scientific expertise, robust clinical data and previous commercial experience key success factors to raising capital 

Report debuted by Cure CEO Seema Kumar at event honoring ARPA-H Director Renee Wegrzyn, PhD, and New York-based awardees of Sprint for Women's Health

NEW YORK, Dec. 5, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Cure®, a healthcare innovation campus in New York City, today released its 2024 Women's Health Benchmark Report, Unlocking the Opportunity: What's Needed to Innovate, Invest and Impact Women's Health. The report found that as women's health grows in the biopharma sector, established scientific expertise, robust clinical data and previous commercial experience are the key success factors to raising capital. However, for women's health to realize its trillion-dollar opportunity, closing the significant gap in data on how sex as a biological variable differentially impacts the health of women is a challenging but essential step.

"In a world where evidence-based medicine is the currency, the paucity of data about sex-linked differences in disease, drug responses, medtech efficacy and health outcomes is a major handicap when seeking funding," said Seema Kumar, CEO of Cure. "Having the expertise in science and commercial leadership can override many other factors to raise investments for women's health, but the best way to start accelerating growth for the sector is to focus on data collection and clinical evidence generation."

Cure released the report during a special event held today at its campus honoring Renee Wegrzyn, PhD, Director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H), and the New York-based companies selected as awardees of the agency's Sprint for Women's Health, which has allocated $113 million to seed innovation and provide a launchpad for women's health research.

Cure's report is based on the results of a comprehensive survey, conducted in partnership with the Deerfield Institute, a division of Deerfield Management Company, an affiliate of Cure, of more than 100 leading healthcare CEOs, founders and investors.

Women's Health Innovation Poised for Transformative Growth
The findings in Cure's report reveal that women's health innovation is poised for transformative growth, but the sector needs to focus on science, data collection and clinical evidence generation to create a compelling business case for investors.

The report also identifies a "Catch-22" for women's health companies: investors demand robust clinical data to justify funding, but limited early-stage investment makes generating such data prohibitively expensive. Sex-specific research is further constrained by high pre-clinical costs and lack of clinical data, and this disproportionately impacts women's health startups.

Not until1993 were women included in clinical trials and only in 2014 did the National Institutes of Health require inclusion of both male and female animals in most funded preclinical research, which resulted in a significant data gap that hinders women's health research today.

Kumar points to National Institutes of Health's Policy on Sex as a Biological Variable as foundational work on research questions, methodology and applicability, but noted that non-dilutive and alternative financing are crucial to build evidence necessary to encourage investment in the health of women from the private sector.

The report reflects the viewpoints of women's health leaders, including:  Katherine Andersen, Head, Life Science & Healthcare, Innovation Banking at HSBC Bank USA, N.A.; Rachel E. Butler, President, Catalytic Impact Foundation; Kristen Dahlgren, Founder & CEO, Cancer Vaccine Coalition; Jessica Federer, MPH, Chair of the NYSE Women's Health Investor Summit; Carolee Lee, CEO and Founder, Women's Health Access Matters (WHAM); Mary Angela O'Neal, MD, Chief, General Neurology, and Director, Women's Neurology Program, at Brigham and Women's Hospital; Viq Pervaaz, Senior Vice President, Life Sciences and Healthcare, New York Economic Development Corporation; Stacey Seltzer, MBA, Managing Partner and Founder of Pontiva Healthcare Partners; Greg Simon, President, Simonovation, LLC, and former Executive Director of the White House Cancer Moonshot Task Force; Stella Vnook, PhD, CEO of Likarda Biotech; and Wegrzyn.

Celebrating New York-Based Awardees of ARPA-H's Sprint for Women's Health
The Dec. 5 Cure event honoring the New York-based awardees of ARPA-H's Sprint for Women's Health, includes a panel discussion featuring  Andersen, Kumar, Perzaaz, Wegrzyn and Jenica Patterson, PhD, Portfolio Lead, Project Accelerator Transition Innovation Office at ARPA-H.

Additionally, attendees will hear presentations by Sprint for Women's Health awardees:

• Alexandra Sakatos, PhD, Ancilia Biosciences
• Sandra Milligan, MD, JD, Aspira Women's Health
• Piraye Beim, PhD, Celmatix
• Christian Kramme, PhD, Gameto
• Elisa Riedo, PhD, Glaucus

About Cure.^®
Cure is a healthcare innovation campus in the heart of New York City that features laboratory and business facilities, a collaboration residency, office space and premium event venues, including an education center, conference center, and iconic rooftop facility, as well as tools, mentoring, networking, and other assistance to members of its ecosystem.

Cure houses more than 20 on-campus startup and established companies, which collectively raised more than $760 million since 2021. Residents regularly create synergies and collaborative partnerships with peer organizations across the spectrum of healthcare, from academic or private to non-profit or government, and focusing on diagnostic, device, drug or vaccine discovery, development and production as well as care delivery and public health. Cure also offers industry-leading event programming focused on critical health topics. Cure's mission is to foster and accelerate advances in health. For more information, please visit wewillcure.com.

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