MEET THE WBL FELLOWS ALUMNI

We’re proud to have strong, inspirational alumni representing the WBL Fellows! Learn about them and their companies below.

2024 Cohort

Emilie Faure

Founder and CEO,
Juniver

Andrea Ippolito

Founder and CEO,
SimpliFed

Sipra Laddha

CEO,
LunaJoy Health

Kelsey Mayo

Co-Founder and CEO,
Armor Medical Inc.

Ariana McGee

CEO,
Navigate Maternity

Erica Plybeah

Founder and CEO,
Medhaul

Emma Rayner

Co-Founder and VP of Sales and Marketing,
Ash Wellness

Sharon Samjitsingh

CEO,
Health Care Originals

Ling Shao

CEO,
SpectrumAi

2023 Cohort

bell-van-der-wal-jessica

Jessica Bell Van der Wal

Co-Founder and CEO,
Frame
bussertjessica

Jessica Bussert

Founder and CEO,
Wave Therapeutics
fan-amy

Amy Fan

Co-Founder,
Twentyeight Health
felten-obi

Obi Felten

Founder and CEO,
Flourish Labs
fitzpatricklisa

Lisa Fitzpatrick

CEO,
Grapevine Health
kavithag

Kavitha Gnanasambandan

Co-Founder and CCO,
Blooming Health, Inc.
harperlyndsey

Lyndsey Harper

Founder and CEO,
Rosy Wellness
lumlungchristine

Christine Lum Lung

Co-Founder and CEO,
Origin Healthcare
nathanjoanna

Joanna Nathan

Co-Founder and CCO,
Prana Thoracic
navarro-pita

Pita Navarro

Co-Founder and Chief Science Officer,
Evvy
radasumareva

Rada Sumareva

Co-Founder and CEO,
ZiphyCare, Inc.

Ready to become a WBL Fellow? Learn more about our eligibility requirements.

Emilie Faure

Founder and CEO, Juniver

As a patient-founder, Emilie Faure is deeply committed to Juniver’s mission to improve outcomes in and access to eating disorder care. She has 12 years of sales experience and a track record of successful partnerships. She has worked in operational roles at auction houses and foundations, building teams and organizational structures from the ground up. She received her B.A. from Harvard University and her M.A. from Sciences-Po, Paris.

Juniver is a health company transforming the $66 billion eating disorder market, offering the first-of-its-kind digital solution with an AI-powered Assistant for on-demand help through urges, evidence-based education, personalized insights from health data, and peer support. Led by a team of ex-Capsule, Modern Fertility, and Mount Sinai experts with deep insight into the problem from lived experience, Juniver is designed to adapt to care models by covering the full continuum, from self-guided digital experiences proven to drive symptom reduction, to a 1:1 virtual clinic. A recent pilot showed Juniver to be 92% effective.

Andrea Ippolito

Founder and CEO, SimpliFed

Andrea Ippolito currently serves as the CEO and Founder of SimpliFed. Prior to joining SimpliFed, Andrea was a Senior Lecturer at Cornell University in the College of Engineering, served as the Senior Advisor to the Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) regarding Electronic Health Record Modernization, and was the Director of the Department of the VA Innovators Network. Andrea was also a Presidential Innovation Fellow based out of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and co-founded an innovative application that improves access to care called Smart Scheduling (acquired by athenahealth in 2016).

Andrea completed her MS in Engineering and Management at MIT. She obtained both her BS in Biological Engineering in 2006 and a Master of Engineering degree in Biomedical Engineering in 2007 from Cornell University.

​​SimpliFed is the leader in virtual-first maternal care at home, providing support for new parents in all 50 states. Powered by their Maternal Operating System (mOS), this unique care experience pathway connects each patient with SimpliFed’s medical providers (IBCLCs, NPs, and RNs), who meet with them to discuss baby feeding, high-risk monitoring, perinatal mood disorder screenings, and social determinant screenings.

This high touchpoint pathway enhances in-person care, as SimpliFed’s providers become an extension of a typical brick-and-mortar clinic. SimpliFed partners with health systems, health plans, and large strategic partners. SimpliFed’s patients are easily referred within their actual medical record, while communication between SimpliFed and a family’s women’s health provider, primary care physician, or pediatrician is seamless. This strong engagement model drives positive clinical outcomes and HEDIS metric compliance for their clients.

Sipra Laddha

CEO, LunaJoy Health

Dr. Sipra Laddha is a pioneering leader in the mental health industry, serving as the CEO of LunaJoy Health. With a profound dedication to improving mental wellness, Dr. Laddha has led LunaJoy to become a premier provider of innovative mental health solutions. Under her leadership, Lunajoy has transformed the landscape of mental health care, ensuring comprehensive and accessible services for patients across diverse communities.

She holds an MD in Psychiatry from a prestigious institution, where she developed a deep understanding of the complexities of mental health. Her career is marked by significant milestones, including the implementation of cutting-edge mental health programs and the development of strategic partnerships with leading healthcare providers. Her expertise in integrating technology with mental health care has positioned LunaJoy at the forefront of digital health innovation.

LunaJoy Health is a leading holistic women’s mental health platform dedicated to providing specialized care for women during critical life stages such as perinatal, maternal, and perimenopausal phases. LunaJoy believes in the importance of personalized, empathetic psychiatric care that supports women’s mental well-being regardless of their life stage. Trusted by payors and provider groups like Sunshine Health, Caresource, Femwell, and Unified Women’s, LunaJoy boasts a team of over 50 therapists, psychiatrists, physician assistants, and coaches who are committed to offering comprehensive support from pregnancy through menopause.

Kelsey Mayo

Co-Founder and CEO, Armor Medical

Kelsey Mayo, Ph. D. is the Co-Founder and CEO of Armor Medical Inc., a biomedical device company dedicated to safeguarding maternal health. Dr. Mayo is a multidisciplinary engineer and empathetic leader with a passion for translational science. She previously led the development and launch of one of the world’s largest and most diverse biomedical research datasets. In her current role as CEO of Armor Medical, Dr. Mayo is using her deep technical expertise and lived experience as a hemorrhage survivor to bring to market the first commercial product to address the urgent demand for an objective, real-time early warning system for maternal hemorrhage.

Founded in June 2022, Armor Medical Inc. emerged from the shared frustration of women engineers with the stagnant state of women’s health innovation. Driven by the need for change, Armor Medical Inc. decided to be the catalyst for a healthcare revolution. Armor Medical Inc. is bringing to market the first commercial product to address the urgent demand for an objective, real-time early warning system for the global leading cause of maternal death: obstetric hemorrhage. This innovative solution is the first in a pipeline of technologies that protect and empower women’s health.

Ariana McGee

CEO, Navigate Maternity

Ariana McGee is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Navigate Maternity. As a Black mother of 4 young children, the maternal mortality and morbidity crisis has been a personal experience for Ariana. Women are dying and specifically, Black women are dying 3-4x the national average during childbirth and postpartum. After becoming pregnant with her third child during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and experiencing the gaps in perinatal care, she decided to create an equitable solution to impact the maternal health crisis. Navigate Maternity was created for underserved mamas by an underserved mama. As a healthcare leader in the biopharmaceutical and medical device industries for the last 10 years, Ariana brings a wealth of knowledge to the commercialization and accessibility of their solution.

As a native of Gary, Indiana and Chicago, Illinois, Ariana has a vested interest in addressing women’s health and racial disparities in healthcare. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her husband, AJ, and their four little ones – Jade (4), Trey (2), Naomi (1), and Aliya (newborn).

Navigate Maternity enhances the coordination of maternal care by remotely monitoring patients and collecting and sharing data to support clinical decision-making. The system captures important biometric, mood disorder, and socioeconomic information from the first prenatal appointment until twelve months after childbirth via the patient’s mobile app and Bluetooth-connected devices. Additionally, it facilitates seamless communication and collaboration between healthcare providers, ensuring that the patient receives timely and coordinated care throughout the perinatal period through enhanced surveillance, early intervention, and support for expectant mothers.

Erica Plybeah

Founder and CEO, MedHaul

Erica Plybeah combines over a decade of expertise in clinical informatics and patient care with her role as a pioneering technology entrepreneur. As the Founder of MedHaul, she has transformed access to medical transportation through an innovative end-to-end platform, earning recognition from Forbes, Essence, Google, and NPR.

Originally from humble beginnings in Greenwood, Mississippi, Erica is an alumna of the University of Wisconsin – Madison. Her career spans influential roles with healthcare and digital health giants including Epic, Flatiron Health, and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, impacting environments from 1-doctor clinics to major health systems.

It is incredibly inefficient for healthcare staff to find and book transportation for high-need patients due to antiquated workflows. MedHaul is a digital health and mobility platform that provides seamless transportation to medical appointments for vulnerable patients across all acuity levels, including door-through-door, wheelchair, and stretcher services. The platform leverages advanced technology for real-time trip scheduling, tracking, advanced insights, and flexible booking options tailored to specific use cases and therapeutic areas. 

By ensuring treatment adherence and visit completion, MedHaul breaks down transportation barriers to non-emergent and preventive medical services, offering reliable and equitable transport for healthcare appointments and essential travel.

MedHaul powers basic, assisted, wheelchair, and stretcher medical transportation services for chronically ill adults and children across 15 states and Washington DC. MedHaul is backed by renowned funders, including Morgan Stanley, BCBSMA, Citi, Google, Merck, and Unseen Capital.

Emma Rayner

Co-Founder and VP of Sales and Marketing,
Ash Wellness

Emma Rayner is the Co-Founder and VP of Sales and Marketing at Ash Wellness, a nationwide at-home diagnostic testing platform. Ash works with payors, digital health companies, public health, and other healthcare organizations to enable white-label at-home testing programs for clinically necessary tests such as HIV, colorectal cancer screening, diabetes, PrEP, heart health, hormone therapy, weight management, and more.

Emma was born in South Africa and has a background in last-mile delivery having worked at Uber and JustEat. She is passionate about using her company and skillset to make a meaningful impact on healthcare in the US. She lives with her husband in NYC and is a new mom.

Ash is a tech-enabled platform that powers health testing with at-home results for a range of client needs including gap closure, condition management, and infectious disease prevention. Ash tailors solutions for a diverse range of clients – including health plans, digital health organizations, and public sector entities – to meet the unique needs of the populations they serve.

Sharon Samjitsingh

CEO, Health Care Originals

Sharon Samjitsingh, a lifelong asthma sufferer, leads a dedicated team at Health Care Originals (HCO) to empower people with chronic respiratory diseases, ensuring they live freely and affordably. With over 25 years of experience, Sharon has successfully commercialized innovative technologies across manufacturing, sustainability, and healthcare. An inventor with 12 patents, she has deployed three groundbreaking technologies in three countries.

Sharon holds an MS from the University of Rochester and a B.Sc. from the University of The West Indies. Named TechRochester’s Technology Woman of the Year in 2020 and one of the Top 100 in Fem Tech and Health Tech by Women of Wearables in 2019, she is also honored in the Names Dress, a 3D-printed art piece celebrating women in STEAM, alongside notable luminaries like Jane Goodall.

Sharon has chaired the World Conference Forum’s Population Health Management Conference and spoken at Wearable Technologies Conferences.

Health Care Originals (HCO) is a pioneering company dedicated to improving the lives of people with chronic respiratory diseases. By leveraging cutting-edge technology and innovative solutions, HCO empowers individuals to live healthier, more unencumbered lives. Their mission is to provide peace of mind to patients and their loved ones while reducing healthcare costs. With a commitment to excellence and a focus on impactful results, HCO is transforming respiratory healthcare for a better future.

Ling Shao

CEO, SpectrumAi

Ling Shao is the Founder and CEO of SpectrumAi, a digital health company that develops innovative solutions for life-changing therapies. As a mom of boys on the autism spectrum, her passion is to improve access to high-quality care for families like hers. Ling’s extensive experience commercializing healthcare services and software includes a decade at UnitedHealth Group in leadership roles managing national account managements and business development for the dual-eligibles. Ling also held leadership roles at two high-growth digital health start-ups as Chief Commercial Officer of Buoy Health and SVP Strategic Solutions of AmWell.

Ling started her career as a senior consultant with Booz Allen Hamilton and as a research nurse at Massachusetts General Hospital.  Prior to finishing college, Ling served in the U.S. Army as a sergeant and a nurse. She holds an MBA from Harvard University and a BS in Nuclear Engineering with a minor in Biomedical Engineering from MIT.

SpectrumAI emerged to address a critical issue in autism therapy: the absence of transparent quality data, hindering the identification and pursuit of effective, top-tier treatment for children with autism. SpectrumAI aims to remedy these foundational challenges by leveraging a session-tracking software platform (EHR) enhanced by artificial intelligence. Its objective is to gather comprehensive data on autism treatment, envisioning a future where care providers are compensated based on the quality of their service rather than the quantity, thus fostering the adoption of best practices.

Jessica Bell van der Wal

Co-Founder and CEO, Frame

Jessica Bell van der Wal is reframing family planning as the Co-Founder and CEO of Frame, a venture she launched with her husband in 2020 following their own fertility crisis. Prior to Frame, she led teams in marketing, customer success, operations, and strategy at various early- and late-stage companies including Castlight Health, Nike, Deloitte Consulting, and Genentech.

She currently sits on the advisory boards of two digital health companies as well as multiple educational institutions, nonprofits, and women’s empowerment organizations. Jessica’s foundational training in public health and international volunteer experience colors her passion for health solutions on a broad scale. Jessica holds a BA in Public Health from UNC Chapel Hill and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Frame is the first collaborative care platform for fertility and family building. Frame partners with healthcare providers and payers to provide holistic care, coaching, and 1:1 support for patients at any stage of their family-building journey, leading to better outcomes and lower costs for everyone involved.

Jessica Bussert

Founder and CEO, Wave Therapeutics

Jessica Bussert is an emergency room nurse, a lifelong technologist, and the founder of Wave Therapeutics. As a child, Jessica taught herself basic electronics at age 10 and how to program computers at 12. She was a published software author at 15 and was programming custom robotics by the time she was 17. She later led European business consulting for one of the largest tech companies in the world before losing that career to discrimination when she transitioned genders in her early 40s. Jessica moved back to the US and became a volunteer firefighter and an EMT before making the decision to go back to school and earn her nursing degree.

Years later, she was working in a small town ER when an ambulance arrived with a disabled vet who was septic and suffering from the worst bedsores she had ever seen. At that moment, Jessica decided to use her tech skills and healthcare experience to found Wave Therapeutics and create a more effective solution to the problem of bedsores that would be affordable to anyone who needed it.

In addition to her work at Wave, Jessica is a professional photographer with her own art gallery, an avid world traveler, and a disaster recovery volunteer. Jessica has been married to her amazing spouse, Sharon, for 30 years. Together they raised five wonderful children.

Wave Therapeutics, a Techstars company, has developed disruptive smart cushioning technology designed to prevent bedsores, save lives, and reduce a huge cost center for long-term and acute care facilities. Their devices help reduce the risks of bedsores and blood clots through a unique combination of tested medical therapies combined with powerful analytics capabilities. Using their technology, healthcare facilities can reduce hospitalization stays and treatment costs, increase reimbursements, and eliminate crippling legal liabilities.

Amy Fan

Co-Founder, Twentyeight Health

Amy Fan is the Co-Founder and President of Twentyeight Health, a mission-driven digital health platform increasing women’s health access for underserved communities. Twentyeight Health provides telemedicine, medication delivery, and care coordination, and is one of the only telehealth platforms to accept Medicaid. Previously, Amy was the General Manager of Onomie Beauty, a direct-to-consumer beauty startup, and a consultant at Bain & Company. She was recognized as Rock Health’s Top 50 in Digital Health in 2021 and Inc’s Female Founder 100 in 2022. Amy holds a Bachelor of Commerce from Queen’s University and an MBA & MPH from UC Berkeley.

Twentyeight Health is a mission-driven women’s health platform providing accessible reproductive and sexual health services to underserved communities through telemedicine, medication delivery, and ongoing care. Twentyeight Health offers affordable access through Medicaid and provides culturally competent care with a clinician network experienced in serving low-income individuals and BIPOC patients. Founded in 2018, Twentyeight Health is active in 34 states and Washington, DC, and is available to 85% of US women of reproductive age.

Obi Felten

Founder and CEO, Flourish Labs

Obi Felten is the Founder and CEO of Flourish Labs, a startup on a mission to scale professional mental health peer support with tech to address the mental health crisis. Flourish Labs trains young adults to become certified peer supporters and offers telehealth peer support for young adults and teenagers. Previously, Obi was Head of Getting Moonshots Ready for Contact with the Real World at Google X, Director of Consumer Marketing for Google in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, and set up e-commerce businesses in Europe.

Obi serves on the boards of Springer Nature, an academic and educational publisher, and Marathon Health, a primary and behavioral health care company for employers. She is also an advisor for the UK NHS Best For You youth mental health initiative. She is an advocate for women and other underrepresented groups in tech. Obi grew up in Berlin, has a BA in Philosophy and Psychology from Oxford University, and lives in California with her husband, children, cats, and dog.

Flourish Labs is on a mission to scale professional mental health peer support with tech to address the mental health crisis. They expand the mental health workforce by hiring and training young adults with diverse backgrounds to become certified mental health Peer Support Specialists.

On peers.net, Flourish Labs’ telehealth platform, young adults and teenagers can book a 1-on-1 session with a peer supporter of their choice on demand, usually within 24 hours. Their peer supporters provide emotional support, teach skills, and share their knowledge of and personal experiences with mental health. Flourish Labs’ proprietary training curriculum was developed to state and national certification standards, in partnership with online learning design experts, peers, and young adults.

Lisa Fitzpatrick, MD

CEO, Grapevine Health

Dr. Lisa Fitzpatrick is the Founder and CEO of Grapevine Health, a digital health media and patient engagement organization working to improve access to trusted health information in Black and brown communities. Dr. Fitzpatrick is an infectious diseases physician and CDC-trained medical epidemiologist. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences Roundtable on Health Literacy and a professorial lecturer for the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics.

Previously, Lisa served as Chief Medical Officer for DC Medicaid. At CDC, she held several leadership positions, including U.S. diplomat for the Caribbean region. She is also a Co-Founder of the Community Wellness Collective, a local non-profit organization that provides health education and exercise programs for underserved residents of Washington, DC. Lisa earned a BA/MD at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, an MPH from the University of California-Berkeley School of Public Health, and an MPA from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Lisa is a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network and an Aspen Institute Health Innovators Fellow.

Grapevine Health is a data-driven patient engagement company that creates and delivers culturally appropriate health education content digitally to help close care gaps for underserved communities. Their mission is to create relatable, compelling health content that increases health literacy, promotes trust between patients and medical professionals, and improves health outcomes for underserved communities.

Grapevine Health knows that health literacy is a powerful social driver of health. With roots in healthcare, technology, and community organizing, their team leverages technical expertise, trusted messengers, and empathetic storytelling to democratize health information, empower patients, and drive sustainable healthy behaviors.

Kavitha Gnanasambandan, PhD

Co-Founder and CCO, Blooming Health, Inc.

Kavitha Gnanasambandan, PhD is the Co-Founder and Chief Commercial Officer of Blooming Health. She received her PhD in Biomedical Sciences from the University of Florida and conducted postdoctoral cancer research at the NYU School of Medicine. Her work in cancer research, healthcare consulting, and digital health helped to bring new treatments and support tools to cancer patients. At Varian Medical Systems, Kavitha led the commercialization of Noona, a remote symptom monitoring platform for cancer patients, through pharmaceutical and payer partnerships.

Her experience as a caregiver to her grandmother and as a volunteer with the NYC Department of Aging inspired her to start Blooming Health with her co-founders. Blooming Health is powering healthy aging in place via an inclusive technology solution that connects all older adults and caregivers with community-based supportive services, regardless of their circumstances.

Blooming Health powers healthy aging in place by enabling all aging service providers to proactively engage underserved older adults and caregivers, and address their health and social needs in a personalized manner. Their age-friendly technology solution is used by a growing network of aging care providers across the US to engage and navigate thousands of older adults and caregivers in one click via automated text, phone calls, or emails in 26+ languages. Further, they enable healthcare organizations to proactively reach members and address their health-related social needs through their community-based, remote engagement solution.

Lyndsey Harper, MD

Founder and CEO, Rosy Wellness

Dr. Lyndsey Harper is a Board Certified Ob/Gyn, Associate Professor of Ob/Gyn for Texas A&M COM, a Fellow of The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and a Fellow of the International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health. Dr. Harper is the founder and CEO of Rosy, an award-winning women’s health technology company that connects women who have sexual health concerns with hope, community, and research-backed solutions. She has been named Forbes Top 53 Women Disrupting Healthcare, People Newspapers’ 20 Under 40, a Top Innovator in North Texas for 2020 and a DBJ Top Woman in Tech.

Rosy Wellness is the first and only physician-founded women’s sexual health platform designed for the 43% of women with sexual health concerns. Now recommended by more than 11% of US ob/gyns, Rosy provides evidence-based patient-centered support including therapeutic education, CBT-based exercises, community, research-backed erotica, and coaching.

Rosy is the 2022 recipient of a Webby Design Award, a recipient of the UCSF Digital Health Award, and is the only app recommended by Cedars Sinai for patients with sexual problems. Rosy is proud to be the doctor-recommended lifetime partner for women’s sexual health concerns including low desire, sexual pain, sexual concerns related to infertility, pregnancy, postpartum, menopause, cancer, and more.

Christine Lum Lung, MD, MBA

Co-Founder and CEO, Origin Healthcare

Christine Lum Lung MD, MBA is a physician entrepreneur committed to improving the health of patients and the future of healthcare. Christine received her B.A. from Stanford University and her MBA from the Yale School of Management. She earned her Doctor of Medicine from the University of Colorado and completed her Internal Medicine Residency at the University of California, San Diego, where she also served as Chief Resident.

Christine is a board-certified physician specializing in hospital medicine and has been practicing for over twenty years. She was the solo founder and CEO of a successful, independent hospital medicine company that she ran for sixteen years. She was a 2021 Poets & Quants “Best and Brightest EMBA” and an inaugural Rock Health Innovation Fellow. Christine is currently the Co-Founder and CEO of Origin Healthcare.

Origin Healthcare is a tech-enabled company partnering with organizations so patients can receive advanced medical care at home, instead of the hospital. Origin’s value-based approach improves access and outcomes while lowering the cost of care by thousands of dollars compared to a facility-based admission. Origin Healthcare won the 2022 Colorado Prime Health Innovation Challenge, receiving a grant to partner with safety net organizations to improve health equity, quality, and cost. Origin believes the home is the future center of healthcare.

Joanna Nathan

Co-Founder and CEO, Prana Thoracic

Joanna Nathan is an investor turned entrepreneur on a mission to improve outcomes for lung cancer patients as the CEO of Prana Thoracic. Prana’s technology is the first minimally invasive medical device to enable early diagnosis and intervention in lung cancer.

At the start of Joanna’s career, she received the gift of entrepreneurship, an unexpected pivot that changed her path from research to innovation. Joanna’s work at Mercury Fund, followed by her role as New Ventures Manager at Johnson & Johnson MedTech Center for Device Innovation, expanded her perspective on innovation to include the investor mindset and ultimately led her to step back into an entrepreneurial role with Prana Thoracic. Joanna is invested in growing and supporting Houston’s life science community. She has mentored countless founders and continues to advocate for students and aspiring entrepreneurs as Co-Founder of Enventure and as President of the Board for Rice University Engineering Alumni.

Houston-based medical device startup Prana Thoracic, Inc. is dedicated to developing solutions for early intervention in lung cancer. Prana Thoracic is developing the first minimally invasive, lung-sparing device for early intervention of suspicious pulmonary nodules.

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in the U.S., making up almost 25% of all cancer deaths. Most lung cancers are diagnosed late after the disease has spread, limiting survival. While over 14 million patients in the U.S. each year are eligible for lung cancer screening, less than 5% are currently getting screened. With Prana Thoracic’s ThoraCore System – which is minimally invasive and lung-sparing – physicians will be able to target lung nodules that are challenging to reach and accurately sample, facilitating definitive diagnosis to dramatically improve outcomes.

Pita Navarro

Co-Founder and Chief Science Officer, Evvy

Pita Navarro is a molecular biologist by training with a deep passion for driving the translation of scientific discoveries into technologies that can improve outcomes and empower women to live healthier lives. As an entrepreneur-scientist, her biotech start-up experience spans research, development, and commercialization of novel diagnostics and digital health tools. Prior to starting Evvy, Pita was a founding team member at Athelas where she led the development of AI-based devices to monitor key biomarkers of inflammation for chronically ill patients.

Evvy is on a mission to close the gender health gap by discovering and leveraging overlooked female biomarkers, starting with the vaginal microbiome. In 2021, Evvy launched the first at-home vaginal microbiome test to use metagenomic sequencing to tell you what’s up down there, why it matters, and what you can do about it. Insights from their test led to the expansion of Evvy’s innovative vaginal health platform, which is the first and only vaginal healthcare service to bring together state-of-the-art testing, precision clinical care and prescription treatment, and 1:1 coaching to give women and people with vaginas the care they deserve. 

Through this platform, Evvy is building the real-world datasets necessary to transform their understanding of complex health conditions in the female body. That means building holistic definitions of what disease and health look like in diverse people, in addition to developing personalized care pathways that are grounded in data — not guesswork.

Rada Sumareva

Co-Founder and CEO, ZiphyCare, Inc.

Dr. Rada Sumareva is a healthcare innovator and notable advocate for inclusion, diversity, and humanitarian causes that benefit at-risk populations. She is the CEO and Co-Founder of Ziphycare, a digital health company with a mission to provide access to quality healthcare for all.

Dr. Sumareva has been a healthcare provider for over two decades, servicing patients with multiple chronic conditions, many of whom come from the most vulnerable communities – the elderly, people with disabilities, people living in care deserts, and the economically disadvantaged. She’s also been involved in a number of health initiatives helping at-risk patients get better access to care, providing health education, raising awareness, and improving compliance through her professional and non-profit affiliations (community boards, Henry Schein Cares Foundation projects, United Healthcare initiatives, JCRC, Alpha Omega, Tel Aviv University, and others). Dr. Sumareva is also a member of the UJA Healthcare Executive Committee and HealthCare Disparities coalition.

ZiphyCare technology helps bridge the gap between telemedicine and in-person exams and enables effective, accessible care and socially responsive health services to chronically ill, vulnerable, and underserved patients while lowering payor costs and improving outcomes through value-based care. 

ZiphyCare’s technology and model help bring high-quality care to every home, connect payer and large physicians organizations with their most complex patients, and enable true continuity of care via data sharing between all the medical team members, including clinical data flow through the EMR interface to any clinic, hospital or health system that needs the patient EHR.