Women’s healthcare has historically been built on incomplete data: U.S. clinical trials didn’t require female participants until 1993, and that gap compounded across decades into misdiagnosis rates that exceed 50% for common vaginal conditions and recurrence rates above 60% even after treatment. Vaginal symptoms are among the leading reasons women seek medical care in the U.S., yet the microbiome driving most of those symptoms has barely been studied at scale, leaving clinicians to treat complex infections with blunt instruments. Evvy addresses that gap directly, offering the world’s only CLIA-certified, NYS CLEP-approved metagenomic sequencing test that identifies 700+ bacteria and fungi from a single at-home swab, combining that with clinician-reviewed diagnoses, personalized treatment protocols, and longitudinal biomarker tracking. The platform now serves more than 100,000 patients and 3,000 practitioners, has generated the world’s largest proprietary vaginal microbiome dataset, and is backed by 15+ peer-reviewed publications including a study of 1,000+ real-world patients showing a 50%+ reduction in bacterial vaginosis recurrence versus standard of care. With its EvvyAI engine interpreting that dataset in real time, the company is now moving from vaginal health into fertility, where a landmark prospective study running in IVF clinics is wrapping up.
AlleyWatch sat down with Evvy Cofounder and CEO Priyanka Jain to learn more about the business, its future plans, recent funding round, and much, much more…
Who were your investors and how much did you raise?
We raised a $40M Series B, led by Catalio Capital Management, with participation from new investors including Rethink Impact, Muse Capital, Flywheel Ventures, and Alumni Ventures, alongside existing investors including Labcorp Venture Fund, General Catalyst, Left Lane Capital, BBG Ventures, Amboy Street Ventures, Ingeborg, and Foreground Capital. This brings our total equity raised to $60M.
Tell us about the product or service that Evvy offers.
Evvy is building the evidence, infrastructure, and technology to make precision, data-driven care the standard for women’s health. Evvy’s Vaginal Health Test is the world’s only CLIA-certified, NYS CLEP-approved metagenomic sequencing (mNGS) test that uncovers 700+ microbes from a single at-home swab. A patient takes the swab at home; we process the sample with our proprietary sequencing assay; we analyze the molecular results alongside her symptoms and health history; and a licensed clinician reviews the results, delivers a diagnosis, and — where relevant — prescribes personalized treatment, all in under 7 days. It’s testing plus precision treatment plus longitudinal biomarker tracking, serving 100k+ patients across vaginal infections, fertility, menopause, and more.
What inspired the start of Evvy?
Women hear “unexplained” constantly — unexplained infertility, unexplained recurrence, unexplained pain. It’s stated like a diagnosis, when it really just means medicine wasn’t built to measure female biology. The vaginal microbiome is a perfect example of that blind spot: a powerful, overlooked biomarker that affects fertility, preterm birth, gynecological cancers, and more — yet it had never been studied or measured at scale. It’s a combination of stigma and a genuine research gap (women weren’t required to be included in U.S. clinical trials until 1993), and that combination — not enough data, not enough research, too many taboos, but huge patient impact — is exactly why we built Evvy.
How is Evvy different?
There are other companies offering vaginal-health testing or wellness-oriented microbiome products, but Evvy is the only one combining clinical-grade metagenomic sequencing, full regulatory licensure, clinical diagnoses, and personalized care across vaginal health, fertility, and menopause. Specifically: (1) we use metagenomic sequencing rather than PCR or 16S, so we detect all bacteria and fungi in a sample, not a limited panel; (2) we’re the only clinical-grade metagenomics test licensed in all 50 states, with every test ordered and reviewed by a licensed clinician (98% sensitivity / 99% specificity on CLEP validation); (3) we’re backed by 15+ peer-reviewed publications, including validation of our own test methodology and a study of 1,000+ real-world BV patients showing our approach significantly improves outcomes; and (4) we’ve built the world’s largest vaginal microbiome dataset, which lets us actually interpret a result for an individual patient rather than just report it. (5) Lastly is our scale — Evvy is the world’s largest vaginal microbiome platform, serving over 100k+ patients and 3k+ clinicians.
What market does Evvy target and how big is it?
Vaginal symptoms are one of the leading reasons women seek healthcare in the U.S., yet patients face 50%+ misdiagnosis rates and 60%+ recurrence rates in traditional care. We’re targeting the women’s health conditions tied to the vaginal microbiome — vaginal infections today, with fertility as our next frontier, and eventually inflammation, PCOS, endometriosis, perimenopause, and HPV progression. Collectively, these conditions cost the healthcare system more than $180 billion in underserved outcomes.
What’s your business model?
Evvy is a testing-and-care platform: patients can access the Vaginal Microbiome Test from our website, and every test includes clinician review and diagnosis. Where clinically appropriate, clinicians can also prescribe treatment, which patients can also fill through Evvy. Beyond consumers, we’re expanding distribution through physicians, health systems, and digital-health and diagnostic partners.
How are you preparing for a potential economic slowdown?
We’ve built Evvy around a real clinical need, not a discretionary wellness purchase — patients come to us because standard-of-care testing failed to explain their symptoms, and that demand doesn’t go away in a downturn. Our capital efficiency has always been a priority: we’ve built the world’s largest proprietary vaginal microbiome dataset over five years on a relatively lean raise, and this round gives us runway to keep validating new diagnostic models without needing to raise opportunistically.
What was the funding process like?
It was exciting, but it also reminded me that women’s health is still in the relatively early days for later-stage venture capital. At the seed and Series A stages, there’s been a huge amount of progress in investors’ understanding that women’s health is a massive opportunity. But as we moved into Series B, we were talking to a different group of growth-stage investors, many of whom haven’t seen many women’s health companies reach this stage. There was still a lot of education involved – almost like going back to our earliest fundraising days.
What are the biggest challenges that you faced while raising capital?
The biggest challenge was helping investors understand that the thing we’ve built doesn’t fit neatly into an existing category. We heard a version of the same question from different sides of the investment ecosystem: Are you a consumer company or a biotech company? Some investors saw our consumer brand and asked why we weren’t simply building a larger consumer health company. Others saw our dataset and AI infrastructure and asked why we were spending time on the consumer experience.
Our answer is that we’re intentionally both. The consumer platform allows us to serve patient needs today while generating longitudinal real-world data; the science and research engine allows us to turn that data into new diagnostic and care models. We think the biggest opportunities in healthcare exist at the intersection, and so much of the fundraising process was about telling that story clearly and finding investors who understood why the combination matters.
What factors about your business led your investors to write the check?
Five things came up repeatedly: (1) our novel test and precision-medicine model, versus just another telehealth offering; (2) our large-scale proprietary dataset; (3) proven market penetration and a trusted consumer brand; (4) published, peer-reviewed evidence on both test accuracy and improved patient outcomes; and (5) the size of the opportunity — vaginal health, fertility, and other indications the platform can expand into. We’re especially excited to have Catalio as our lead investor given their incredible expertise in diagnostics and life sciences.
What are the milestones you plan to achieve in the next six months?
Our near-term focus is clinically validating a new generation of EvvyAI-powered diagnostic and care models, starting with fertility — we’re wrapping up a landmark prospective study run in IVF clinics. Alongside that, we’re focused on expanding access to Evvy’s platform through physicians, health systems, and digital-health partners.
What advice can you offer companies in New York that do not have a fresh injection of capital in the bank?
Focus relentlessly on the thing that is hardest to replicate: a product customers genuinely need, evidence that it works, and a business model that can become durable. New York is an incredible place to build because of the density of talent, customers, clinical institutions, and capital—but those advantages matter most when you are disciplined about priorities and honest about what is creating value.
Where do you see the company going now over the near term?
We’re entering what feels like a really exciting new chapter for Evvy. For the first five years, we focused on building the platform, serving patients, and creating the dataset. Now we have more than 100,000 patients and a body of clinical-grade data that lets us ask much bigger questions. Near term, we’re starting with fertility, while continuing to build out the vaginal health platform that got us here. We’ll validate new AI-powered diagnostic and care models, expand through physicians and partners, and continue discovering novel biomarkers across women’s health.
Longer term, the vision is a “new-age Pap smear” — an at-home, non-invasive sample giving women regular, data-rich insight across infections, inflammation, fertility, PCOS, endometriosis, perimenopause, and HPV progression. Ultimately, I want “unexplained” to become a much less common word in women’s healthcare. We want to build the definitive diagnostic engine for women’s health – one that finally makes the female body measurable, understandable, and treatable with the same level of precision we expect everywhere else in medicine.
What’s your favorite fall destination in and around the city?
I love getting out of the city in the fall – there’s something about seeing the leaves change that makes you slow down a little. The Hudson Valley is one of my favorite places to escape to for a weekend, especially when you can combine a hike with good food and a little time offline. But honestly, one of the best things about New York in the fall is that you don’t have to go very far. A long walk through Central Park on a crisp fall day is pretty hard to beat.
