NEW YORK, October 23rd, 2024 — Gameto has been selected by the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) as an awardee of the Sprint for Women’s Health, to address critical unmet challenges in women’s health, champion transformative innovations, and tackle health conditions that uniquely or disproportionately affect women. Gameto will receive $10 million in funding over two years through the Sprint for Women’s Health launchpad track for later-stage health solutions.
Gameto is a biotechnology company dedicated to advancing treatment options in women’s health. The funding will be used to advance Gameto's menopause program, Ameno, through the completion of animal studies and toward the initiation of first-in-human clinical trials. The Ameno program seeks to address the unmet needs of millions of women by developing groundbreaking therapies that alleviate the symptoms and long-term health risks of menopause. This program aims to go beyond current symptom-based treatments for menopause by addressing the root causes, and in turn the conditions that cause morbidity in women post-menopause, including cardiovascular disorders, musculoskeletal disorders, and sexual and mental health, helping women maintain their quality of life longer term. More information about the Ameno program and Gameto’s other initiatives in women’s health is available on the company’s website.
"We are excited to be an ARPA-H Sprint for Women’s Health awardee, and advance the Ameno program through preclinical studies and hopefully into human trials," said Dina Radenkovic, Co-founder and CEO of Gameto. "Ovaries lose function earlier than the rest of the body, leading to many women spending two thirds of their lives dealing with a degree of infertility, and one third of their lives in a stage of poor health post-menopause. Currently with our lead program, Fertilo, we are looking to reduce the hormonal burden on women and address infertility. Now with this award, we have sufficient resources to further apply our cell engineering technology and bring forward a program for women going through menopause, an area with even fewer treatment options.”
ARPA-H sought solutions within six topics of interest in women’s health, and received an unprecedented response of submissions. ARPA-H launched the Sprint for Women’s Health in February, with First Lady Jill Biden announcing the funding as the first major deliverable from the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research.
The ARPA-H Sprint for Women’s Health is conducted in collaboration with the Investor Catalyst Hub of ARPANET-H, the agency’s nationwide health innovation network that connects people, innovators, and institutions to accelerate better health outcomes for everyone. Gameto will work with an ARPA-H Program Manager and the Investor Catalyst Hub over two years to develop their proposed solution, receiving milestone-based payments aligned to research activities and performance objectives.
The ARPA-H launchpad program accelerates transformative health solutions’ path to impact by providing funding and market transition support. As a launchpad performer, Gameto will also work with an Entrepreneur-in-Residence and participate in Launchpad Accelerator, which includes customized curriculum, virtual events, and in-person workshops to support performer market transition.
About Gameto
Gameto is a biotechnology company developing novel treatment solutions for women's health. Gameto brings together an experienced scientific management team with the vision and passion to develop a product suite to support women throughout their reproductive journeys. The company’s lead program, Fertilo, aims to make IVF and egg freezing shorter, safer, and more accessible through reduced hormonal injections by maturing eggs outside of the body. Beyond turning IVF into something everyone can do, Gameto has a cell engineering platform that was developed in collaboration with Professor George Church’s lab at Harvard Medical School. The platform yields a pipeline of products in women’s and reproductive health, including a menopause program that is currently undergoing animal testing in order to begin first-in-human trials. Gameto is led by physician-turned-entrepreneur Dina Radenkovic as CEO and serial entrepreneur and founder of North America's largest fertility network Prelude Fertility, Martin Varsavsky, as Chairman. For more information, go to gametogen.com or follow us on Twitter and Instagram @gametogen and on LinkedIn.
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