Gameto has created a three-part platform for ovarian therapeutics that will address menopause and assisted fertility.
Doctors, philosophers and scientists have tinkered at extension of the human lifespan, trying to figure out how to prolong our perpetual flight from the reaches of death. Usually, though, the focus is on the addendum of years to the end of our lives.
A fresh, go-getting start-up called Gameto is pointing out that an extension of the human lifespan is not the end-all-be-all target of augmented human longevity. Instead, this biotechnology company is researching the longevity of one of the human body’s fastest aging organs: the ovaries, and on Monday, it announced $20 million in Series A financing to expand these efforts.
Aging up to five times faster than the rest of the body, the subsequent decrease in fertility is what marks the start of menopause for the majority of women and the beginning of several associated symptoms and conditions that can heavily impact the daily lives of those experiencing it. And now that humans live almost twice as long as we used to, most women are looking at twice the amount of time spent with menopause and its after-effects.
“Ovaries age five times faster than other organs, resulting in infertility, early menopause and increased years of poor health for women. We want to change the narrative of female reproductive longevity and address the root causes of sex/gender inequality in our society,” said Gameto CEO Dr. Dina Radenkovic, M.D. in the press release.
With research that began in the laboratories of George Church at Harvard Medical School’s Wyss Institute, Gameto has created a three-part platform for ovarian therapeutics that will address menopause and assisted fertility: Fertilo, focused on the improvement of assisted fertility and working to eliminate female infertility; Deovo, focused on uncovering pharmaceutical treatments and constructing a computational platform for ovarian aging; and Ameno, focused on alleviating the medical burdens of menopause by finding a way to make it optional, not entirely unlike skipping the sugar pills in traditional birth control so that a woman doesn’t start her period.
“We have strong preclinical evidence to believe in our platform,” Dr. Radenkovic said. Its development is being guided by Martin Varsavsky, whose previous entrepreneurial efforts include a nationwide network of fertility centers that spans the United States known as Prelude Fertility.
Investment firms seem to agree, as Gameto originally raised $3 million in seed funding from the SALT Fund, Atomic founder Jack Abraham, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong and Coatue Management founder Dan Rose.
The Series A funding was led by Future Ventures with collaboration from Robert Nelsen, Anne Wojcicki, Bold Capital Partners and TA Ventures.
