Unravel Health is developing a palm-sized device designed to track women’s hormone data daily, aiming to bridge a gap between blood tests and wearable estimates. The London-based company has raised £2.5 million to advance its Micro Lab, which reads multiple hormones from a saliva sample at home in minutes. The funding round was led by Conduit EIS Impact Fund and Wrightwood, with participation from Leo Capital, Embryo Ventures, Hermesa, and returning investor Zinc VC.
Funding and Product Details
The Micro Lab targets a market where hormonal fluctuations are critical for understanding conditions like polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) and menopause. Current methods either capture a single blood test snapshot or rely on wearables that estimate hormone levels. “People said nobody could climb Everest without oxygen, until someone did,” said Veronika Bridgman, Unravel’s co-founder and CEO. “Reading hormones in saliva outside a lab has been our Everest.” Bridgman, who lives with polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome (PMOS), previously created a homemade tracker to manage her symptoms, as blood tests provided limited insight into her daily hormonal changes.
The device uses technology protected by three granted patents to measure oestradiol, the primary form of estrogen, alongside three other key hormones simultaneously. This funding will support external equivalency studies, additional marker development, and the start of regulatory approval processes. Early-access devices are planned for 2027 through partnerships with pharmacies, digital health platforms, and clinical research organizations. The underlying technology has previously been tested on markers for heart health and prostate cancer, suggesting broader applications for at-home lab testing.
Technology and Market Impact
Saliva contains hormones in quantities too low for standard at-home testing, but Unravel’s innovation aims to replicate lab-grade sensitivity outside clinical settings.
The company emphasizes that women’s health involves multiple hormones, not just one, which the Micro Lab addresses by analyzing several markers at once. Bridgman’s personal journey highlights the need: “Fifteen years ago I built my own hormone tracker to manage PCOS, because a blood test told me almost nothing about what my body was doing,” she said. “Soon anyone will be able to bring the lab home to understand their symptoms.”
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Eva-Maria Dimitriadis of Conduit EIS Impact Fund noted that women’s hormonal health remains a largely underserved market due to data gaps, emphasizing the significance of solving a persistent technical challenge. “Unravel is solving a hard technical problem that many are trying to address: measuring multiple hormones accurately, longitudinally, and affordably,” she said. Henry Engelhardt of Wrightwood added that hormone-related conditions profoundly impact daily life, yet diagnostic tools have stagnated for decades. “Unravel’s approach could change how these conditions are diagnosed and managed,” he said, praising the team’s scientific depth and focus on user needs.
Angel investor Andrea Sinclair, who has handled fertility treatments and menopause, emphasized the demand for data-driven insights. “What I wanted was real science and data,” Sinclair said. “Understanding what was actually going on with my hormones would have been transformative back then, and it matters just as much now as I try to live well for longer.” This total builds on over £1 million previously secured from Innovate UK, the Medical Research Council, SBRI, and angel investors. The project reflects a growing trend in at-home diagnostic tools, though few have tackled the complexity of multi-hormone analysis with such precision.
