London-based digital health company, Flo Health, announced Tuesday that the company secured $200 million in series C funding, with General Atlantic backing the series C round.
The investment has raised at least $265 million to date, which includes a $50 million series B round in 2021, and said that it’s the first purely digital consumer women’s health app to achieve unicorn status—which is when a startup’s valuation reaches $1 billion.
“Reaching unicorn status is a significant milestone for Flo and the entire femtech industry,” said Dmitry Gurski, co-founder and CEO of Flo Health, in a statement. “When we started Flo, we identified a huge gap in women’s health services. Now, we’re a leader in a global movement to make women’s health a priority everywhere.”
With the newly secured funds, Flo Health plans on making innovative updates to the digital platform, stating that the funding will position Flo Health for its next phase of growth with a focus on “expanding into new user segments including perimenopause and menopause.” The company also plans to invest in building out its tech-driven health insights, “pursuing strategic expansion opportunities,” executives said in a press release.
Flo Health is a consumer-based app that is currently supported by more than 120 doctors and health experts. App users can monitor over 70 symptoms, accessing various features that are designed to enhance their understanding and management of their well-being, including access to a private digital discussion community focused on health and wellness-related topics. The app provides period, menstrual, and ovulation tracking, tailored health insights, a fertility calculator, and guidance during pregnancy. As of June 2024, Flo Health serves nearly 70 million monthly active users, with close to 5 million paid subscribers.
While the funding will aid Flo Health in its future goals, back in 2021 the company faced troubling times over its data-sharing practices. In January of that year, the company settled with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over allegations that the company was dishonest with its users about sharing private health information with third-party firms, including Facebook and Google.
The company had promised to keep users’ health information private and only use them to provide the app’s services to users. However, the FTC’s complaint alleged that Flo Health disclosed health data from millions of users of its Flo period and ovulation tracker app to third parties that provided marketing and analytics services to the app, including Facebook’s analytics division, Google’s analytics division, Google’s Fabric service, AppsFlyer, and Flurry, according to the complaint.
In a settlement with the FTC, Flo Health was required to notify impacted users about the disclosure of their health information, as well as instruct any third party involved that received the app users’ health information to destroy the data.
With challenging times behind it, the company plans to reach its goals with the new funds by increasing its R&D headcount with investments to grow its teams in its global offices in Europe and North America.
“Flo also intends to leverage General Atlantic’s significant expertise in scaling companies at the intersection of consumer technology, healthcare, and subscription business models,” executives said.
Providing up to 1 billion women in need with free access to Flo Premium, Flo Health’s Pass it on Project aims to improve health literacy, with Gruski stating, “We’re already helping hundreds of millions of women, and our goal is to reach 1 billion women through our global pro-social program. This initiative provides free access to Flo Premium across 66 countries, including India, Indonesia, and Nigeria, with nearly 12 million women already benefiting.”
General Atlantic’s investment will ultimately help propel Flo Health’s growth and mission to continue “normalizing conversations about women’s health, improving health literacy, and raising awareness of women’s health issues worldwide, especially in underserved regions,” Gurski said.
