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Speaker 1: At kind Body, our clinics are unique. They're not your

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Speaker 1: typical doctor's office. They're not sterile white walls. They're warm,

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Speaker 1: they're inviting, they're more spa like.

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Speaker 2: We have a radical that's an ad for a venture

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Speaker 2: backed startup called kind Body. It's a rapidly growing company

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Speaker 2: that operates dozens of fertility clinics around the US, and

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Speaker 2: it's gotten attention for its warmer, millennial friendly approach to

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Speaker 2: in vitro fertilization and other procedures. But Bloomberg's Jackie Devallos

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Speaker 2: reports that current and former employees and some patients describe

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Speaker 2: a bonus driven business model, understaffed clinics, and inconsistent safety

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Speaker 2: protocols that they say contributed to errors.

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Speaker 1: There were a few accidents that involved embryos being dropped,

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Speaker 1: being left out that had disrupted an IVF cycled, and

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Speaker 1: so that cycle was disrupted because of a mistake that

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Speaker 1: the clinic had made. And so a couple of these

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Speaker 1: accidents and left a real impression on some of the

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Speaker 1: employees who had been working there who saw this firsthand.

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Speaker 2: I'm Wescasova today on the big take the challenges of

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Speaker 2: building a new kind of fertility clinic. Jackie tell us

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Speaker 2: about kind Body.

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Speaker 1: Kind Body was founded in twenty eighteen, and it was

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Speaker 1: founded by a woman named Gina Bartazi, who was a

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Speaker 1: real veteran in the IVF industry. She had started two

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Speaker 1: other businesses that had grown to become what was one

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Speaker 1: of the largest fertility networks in the country at the time,

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Speaker 1: and it came onto the scene at a time when

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Speaker 1: feminist ideals were really strong. Trump had just gotten elected

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Speaker 1: and the me Too movement was underway. She left right

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Speaker 1: before the company iPod and started kind Body, which was

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Speaker 1: intended to be a disruptor in the fertility industry, and

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Speaker 1: it wanted to achieve that by being a little bit

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Speaker 1: more accessible. It was what they called the soul cycle

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Speaker 1: of fertility. Really bright design, this colorful, warm esthetic, and

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Speaker 1: it was very intentional to attract this millennial woman that

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Speaker 1: was prioritizing her career and wanted to take control of

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Speaker 1: starting a family rather than feeling pressured to do it

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Speaker 1: at an age when they didn't feel ready. And so

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Speaker 1: they spoke to that message in their marketing and the

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Speaker 1: way they designed the clinics.

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Speaker 2: And what kind of services does kind Body provide?

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Speaker 1: So the company provides predominantly IVF, so that's in vitro

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Speaker 1: fertilization treatment as well as egg freezing. So if you're

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Speaker 1: a young woman who wants to put off starting a

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Speaker 1: family but you don't want to be caught off guard

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Speaker 1: in your forties, you can freeze your eggs and the

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Speaker 1: company stores them for you, retrieves them, takes you through

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Speaker 1: that process, and then for people who are ready to

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Speaker 1: start a family, kind Body helps you do the IVF

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Speaker 1: process if you've had trouble conceiving through traditional methods. The

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Speaker 1: company pitches itself as giving women the choice, and for

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Speaker 1: many women they don't really know when they want to

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Speaker 1: start a family, which is where egg freezing really comes

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Speaker 1: into play. And for people that have had infertility troubles,

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Speaker 1: IVF is kind of the first route you go to,

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Speaker 1: and they offer that at all of their clinics. The

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Speaker 1: difference between kind Body and some of the other players

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Speaker 1: out there is that they do this all under one roof,

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Speaker 1: and kind Body was saying, well, we have our own

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Speaker 1: brick and mortar clinics, and by doing so, not only

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Speaker 1: do we bring costs down, but we can control the quality.

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Speaker 1: We know exactly what standards we have in our labs,

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Speaker 1: we don't have to wait for clinics to get back

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Speaker 1: to us, and it kind of removes that additional layer

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Speaker 1: of friction between the patient and the doctor there.

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Speaker 2: And so how has it worked so far?

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Speaker 1: The company's gotten the support of celebrity investors like Gwyneth Paltrow,

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Speaker 1: Chelsea Clinton, Gabrielle Union, and it's gotten a lot of

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Speaker 1: clout throughout the country because it's expanded its clinics into

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Speaker 1: really buzzy metropolitan areas in New York and in San Francisco,

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Speaker 1: Santa Monica, and Los Angeles, Chicago. It also underwent this

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Speaker 1: major acquisition of a network in the Midwest that expanded

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Speaker 1: its footprint pretty much doubled the size of its network

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Speaker 1: to thirty three clinics now actually, and so they have

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Speaker 1: really gotten off the ground, not just appealing to consumers

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Speaker 1: who walk in and want to see out this treatment,

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Speaker 1: but also through the employer benefits side. So it's two

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Speaker 1: very different customer bases. So now you have companies like

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Speaker 1: Tesla and Rivian. Walmart is a major client for them

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Speaker 1: where they become the preferred provider for their employees.

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Speaker 3: Walmart's teaming up with a fertility company to offer benefits

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Speaker 3: for employees looking to expand their families. The nation's largest

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Speaker 3: retailer is partnering with kind Body to offer benefits like

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Speaker 3: IVF and fertility testing regardless of sex, sexual orientation, gender identity,

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Speaker 3: or marital status.

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Speaker 1: And so because of that, they've had to open up

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Speaker 1: more clinics in eras where those clients are, and that's

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Speaker 1: expanded their footprint quite a bit.

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Speaker 2: So, Jackie, as you say, this company's been around since

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Speaker 2: twenty eighteen, what made you want to write about it now?

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Speaker 1: At the time, I had been reporting on kind of

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Speaker 1: the health tech space and the impact of venture capital

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Speaker 1: dollars flowing into a sector where the stakes are really

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Speaker 1: high and the priorities that investors have that end up

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Speaker 1: being imposed on the companies that they back can sometimes

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Speaker 1: conflict with patient care. And this had come onto my

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Speaker 1: radar after looking at my own Instagram and my own TikTok.

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Speaker 1: I'm a thirty two year old woman and exactly the

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Speaker 1: kind of demographic that kind Body targets, and I had

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Speaker 1: gotten some of these ads for a while and got

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Speaker 1: curious about why that marketing was pretty targeted and if

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Speaker 1: anyone else was getting it. I had gotten a tip

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Speaker 1: from a user on Reddit that was commenting on kind

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Speaker 1: of their experience at the company. They were a former employee,

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Speaker 1: and they basically told me, you should really look into

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Speaker 1: those laboratories where these IVF treatments are really happening. And

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Speaker 1: it didn't take long for me to uncover some other employees,

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Speaker 1: both current and former staff, that were really concerned about

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Speaker 1: the quality of care and what the rapid expansion meant

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Speaker 1: for their ability to provide good quality care to patients.

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Speaker 2: So let's talk about that. What exactly did you find

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Speaker 2: At a couple.

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Speaker 1: Other clinics, and namely the Brian Park, New York City location,

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Speaker 1: there were a few accidents that involved embryos being dropped,

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Speaker 1: being left out that had disrupted an IVF cycle, which

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Speaker 1: is basically the process in which a woman in jext

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Speaker 1: herself with hormones, the eggs are retrieved, the embryos are

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Speaker 1: fertilized and eventually implanted, and so that cycle was disrupted

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Speaker 1: because of a mistake that the clinic had made. And

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Speaker 1: so a couple of these accidents left a real impression

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Speaker 1: on some of the employees who had been working there

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Speaker 1: who saw this firsthand. There was a couple in New

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Speaker 1: York who had sought treatment in the Prime Park, New

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Speaker 1: York City location and were looking to basically have an

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Speaker 1: embryo transfer. They had a number of embryos already stored

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Speaker 1: at the company, and when they got there they were

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Speaker 1: notified that the wrong one had been defrosted, and they

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Speaker 1: weren't really in a position to make much of a choice.

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Speaker 1: So one option would have been to refreeze the embryo

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Speaker 1: and risk that embryo being damaged, or continue with the transfer.

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Speaker 1: They decided to continue with the transfer. It didn't result

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Speaker 1: in a successful pregnancy, and that can happen for a

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Speaker 1: variety of reasons. Kind Body has said that they acknowledged

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Speaker 1: the mistake, but pointed to the fact that this doesn't

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Speaker 1: really happen that often at their clinics. Another thing to

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Speaker 1: note about this particular incident is that it was the

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Speaker 1: wrong embryo for a variety of reasons that aren't completely

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Speaker 1: clear to us. According to current informer employees, it might

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Speaker 1: have been the wrong quality embryo, it might have been

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Speaker 1: the wrong gender. It's already a really fraught time. It's

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Speaker 1: an emotional period for a family, and so even though

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Speaker 1: it didn't result in a successful pregnancy, it left them

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Speaker 1: with a lot of reticence to continue IVF going forward.

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Speaker 1: In total, we uncovered three incidents in New York. One

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Speaker 1: of them involved the wrong embryo being thought, another one

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Speaker 1: an embryo was accidentally dropped, and another one was left

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Speaker 1: out in room temperature and effectively destroyed. And in that case,

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Speaker 1: it was the woman's last embryo and extremely unfortunate because

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Speaker 1: the company's way of remedying that was to offer her

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Speaker 1: unlimited IVF cycles forever, but she ultimately was not able

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Speaker 1: to conceive at kind Body.

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Speaker 2: And what did kind Body say when you asked them

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Speaker 2: about each of these incidents at the New York location.

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Speaker 1: They acknowledged that they had happened and pointed to some

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Speaker 1: improvements that had been implemented since. And some of those

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Speaker 1: include color coating dishes and requiring what they call additional

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Speaker 1: verification for labels to prevent that going forward. Now we

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Speaker 1: know that one of the earliest accidents occurred in twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty one. However, we we also found an example in

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Speaker 1: an Atlanta clinic that just occurred this past March.

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Speaker 2: Kind Body also said it conducts a root cause analysis

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Speaker 2: after incidents, including the ones Bloomberg raised and correct processes

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Speaker 2: where necessary. In her reporting, Jackie found that examples of

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Speaker 2: embryos being mislabeled, lost, or accidentally destroyed occurred in four

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Speaker 2: clinics around the country over the past three years, according

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Speaker 2: to two current employees and a dozen former employees.

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Speaker 1: Some other issues that the company went through included how

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Speaker 1: they retrofit clinics, and that was done, according to employees,

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Speaker 1: done in a hasty way that resulted in issues like

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Speaker 1: gases being omitted into the clinic from sewer pipes that

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Speaker 1: were left open that occurred in Austin and Atlanta. The

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Speaker 1: HVAC systems were installed properly that led to a flood

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Speaker 1: after a leak leading to a ceiling being burst open.

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Speaker 1: And the reason that significant is because they occurred in

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Speaker 1: areas that were adjacent or very close to the embryology lab.

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Speaker 1: And embryology labs require very specific specifications to make sure

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Speaker 1: that the air quality is monitored appropriately. Things like temperature

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Speaker 1: and what they call volatile organic compounds things like perfume

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Speaker 1: can actually impact the development and the quality of an embryo,

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Speaker 1: and so having a flood coming through the ceiling or

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Speaker 1: foul smelling gases in Austin seeping into the clinic are

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Speaker 1: actually quite significant risks for an IBF lab.

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Speaker 2: And I imagine you asked kind Body about that as well.

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Speaker 1: Yes, and they admitted that they had issues when these

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Speaker 1: clinics opened up, that they remedied these issues in a

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Speaker 1: timely manner. But from what we understand, current informer employees

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Speaker 1: in other clinics, like in Brian Park, which is one

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Speaker 1: of the longest running clinics, have continued to struggle with

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Speaker 1: HVAC issues as early as twenty twenty. The company says

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Speaker 1: that they immediately addressed them.

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Speaker 2: In a statement, kind Body also said no patients, tissues

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Speaker 2: or embryos were directly impacted, and it said that to

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Speaker 2: suggest that kind Body's laboratories are substandard and not meeting

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Speaker 2: industry norms is false. After the break, how does kind

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Speaker 2: Body compare to other US fertility clinics, Jackie? How were

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Speaker 2: you able to find patients to speak to?

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Speaker 1: Sources obviously could not disclose their identity for privacy reasons

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Speaker 1: and health laws and HIPPA that prevented them from doing that,

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Speaker 1: but there were some that had left reviews on sites

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Speaker 1: like Yelp and Google and Reddit, and it was months

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Speaker 1: of trying to track these people down. But the more

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Speaker 1: specific accounts I was able to get from current and

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Speaker 1: former employees, the better I was able to do that.

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Speaker 1: But it was really hard because people want to move

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Speaker 1: on from this, and even when in some cases where

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Speaker 1: their embryos were mishandled and it was traumatic at the time,

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Speaker 1: in some cases they ended up having a baby, and

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Speaker 1: so in their minds, they want to move on from

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Speaker 1: that incident, given the outcome eventually was a positive one

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Speaker 1: for their family.

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Speaker 2: And you say you've spoken to quite a few employees

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Speaker 2: at different locations at the company. How were you able

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Speaker 2: to find them and why were they willing to speak

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Speaker 2: to you.

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Speaker 1: I spoke to nurse practitioners, doctors, lab professionals, everyone across

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Speaker 1: finance to sales to marketing. So over three dozen people

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Speaker 1: I connected with had different types of experiences that intersected

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Speaker 1: with these accidents. The clinical professionals, so the doctors, the embryologists,

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Speaker 1: the lab professionals felt compelled to speak to me because

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Speaker 1: they saw how quickly the company was expanding and they

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Speaker 1: were concerned that more accidents could happen. They had initially

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Speaker 1: thought about some of the mishandling incidents kind of like

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Speaker 1: startup growing pains that this can happen at many companies.

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Speaker 1: It's not unusual in the fertility industry for accidents to happen.

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Speaker 1: It's risky business. But many employees shared with me that

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Speaker 1: the company was expanding at an even faster clip, and

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Speaker 1: with this IPO kind of looming as this big goal,

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Speaker 1: what it would take to get there and what that

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Speaker 1: would mean for patients, The potential for more mistakes was

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Speaker 1: really concerning for them.

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Speaker 2: Jack, As you say, IVF is an imperfect science, it's difficult,

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Speaker 2: and people make mistakes. How how different is kind Body

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Speaker 2: from the thousands of other fertility clinics around the country

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Speaker 2: when it comes to mistake rates or mishaps or things

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Speaker 2: that just don't go right.

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Speaker 1: The government does not have any repository or database for

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Speaker 1: tracking these accidents. There is a study that we point

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Speaker 1: to in the story that tracks one lab across twelve

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Speaker 1: years and they find that these kind of accidents occur

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Speaker 1: onesid of every two thousand cycles. And kind Body says

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Speaker 1: that their overall incident rate across all of their clinics

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Speaker 1: is aboutzero point two percent, and that aligns with what

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Speaker 1: that study found. However, that studies just looking at one lab,

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Speaker 1: which is not really comparing apples to apples to kind

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Speaker 1: Body's incident rate because kind Body would not disclose what

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Speaker 1: each clinics incident rate was.

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Speaker 2: In a statement provided by kind Body, Stephen Cats, the

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Speaker 2: chief executive officer of ARII Protect, a risk management and

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Speaker 2: insurance company for IVF clinics including kind Body, said that

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Speaker 2: kind Body's incident rates are in the lowest quartile of

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Speaker 2: the clinics that he covers. Katz told Bloomberg that his

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Speaker 2: firm covers about half of all fertility doctors and IVF

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Speaker 2: labs in the country.

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Speaker 1: Because there's no real mechanism or requirement for other fertility

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Speaker 1: clinics to report these types of accidents, it's really hard

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Speaker 1: to know what else is going on in the industry overall.

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Speaker 1: And that really has to do with the fact that

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Speaker 1: regulation in the industry isn't where it should be according

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Speaker 1: to experts who follow the industry, And.

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Speaker 2: What did they tell you specifically about that.

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Speaker 1: So there's a few government agencies that touch aspects of

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Speaker 1: the IVF industry. You have the Centers for Disease Control

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Speaker 1: that are tracking which IVF labs are certified to be

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Speaker 1: open and then you have the FDA that regulates things

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Speaker 1: like medical devices used, but they don't actually regulate how

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Speaker 1: the procedures are carried out. The FDA cares more about

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Speaker 1: donor services, so how are embryos and sperm being stored,

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Speaker 1: for example. And then you have independent bodies that are

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Speaker 1: more like industry groups and a compilation of experts in

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Speaker 1: the industry that set out these guidelines, but there is

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Speaker 1: no real enforcement. The CDC is not tracking or policing

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Speaker 1: how companies are actually carrying out some of these standards

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Speaker 1: and practices, and because of that, the onus falls to

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Speaker 1: the companies themselves. They end up self policing in many cases.

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Speaker 1: And you can get accreditation by organizations like the College

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Speaker 1: of American Pathologists. You get a nice stamp of approval,

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Speaker 1: but that's a voluntary process, and so what that offers

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Speaker 1: to patients is this stamp that gives you some layer

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Speaker 1: of credibility. But that process, you get an inspection when

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Speaker 1: you first open. Then you get this self completed checklist

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Speaker 1: that clinics complete on their own, and then another inspection

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Speaker 1: is conducted the following year, so that consistent follow up

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Speaker 1: isn't really there, and that government oversight, isn't there either.

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Speaker 2: Is this unique to the US or is this the

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Speaker 2: way it's done around the world.

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Speaker 1: No, you know, you have the UK, they have different

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Speaker 1: regulations for things like a process called double witnessing, and

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Speaker 1: that's really important because double witnessing is when you have

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Speaker 1: at least two embryologists overseeing what's going on in the

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Speaker 1: embryology lab. At kind Body, there were times when there

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Speaker 1: was only one embryologist in the lab when some of

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Speaker 1: these procedures were being conducted, and current informer employees say

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Speaker 1: that that was a big problem because as they got

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Speaker 1: more patients, some of these embryologists were getting burned out.

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Speaker 1: In the UK, for example, it's mandated by law that

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Speaker 1: you have to have at least two people double witnessing

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Speaker 1: two humans, and the experts that we spoke to said

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Speaker 1: that there is no replacement for having another human there

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Speaker 1: and at accompanied at kind Body. In the US, that

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Speaker 1: isn't really mandated by law.

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Speaker 2: And Jackie, what did kind Body say about this question

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Speaker 2: of whether embryologists that their labs were burnt out overworked?

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Speaker 1: They said that they were staffing their clinics appropriately and

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Speaker 1: they said that they staff it according to volumes, so

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Speaker 1: on more high volume days that they would staff it

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Speaker 1: up with more people. But they also pointed to the

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Speaker 1: fact that turnover among embryologists is at what they called

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Speaker 1: the industry level, and that they weren't an outlier in

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Speaker 1: that way.

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Speaker 2: You also report about the pay and incentive packages for

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Speaker 2: people who worked at kind Body and how that affected

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Speaker 2: some of the procedures that were performed.

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Speaker 1: That's right. Current and former doctors I spoke to said

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Speaker 1: that kind Body had an aggressive sales culture that when

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Speaker 1: patients came in for a consultation that nurse practitioners were

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Speaker 1: required to basically call them back at least three times

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Speaker 1: before they were taken off this interested list, and nurse

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Speaker 1: practitioners and doctor said that they felt uncomfortable with that approach,

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Speaker 1: that even though quotas kind of exist across the industry,

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Speaker 1: that this is how a clinic makes money. That kind

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Speaker 1: Body went about in an aggressive way by then telling

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Speaker 1: doctors at monthly meetings, our numbers are low. We need

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Speaker 1: to increase cycles. And one of the way they were

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Speaker 1: told to do that is through a process called dual stimulation,

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Speaker 1: basically makes a woman undergo the egg retrieval process kind

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Speaker 1: of twice in one cycle. The dual stimulation procedure is

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Speaker 1: really designed for women who produce relatively few egs, so

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Speaker 1: you might see this more common in older women, and

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Speaker 1: it's a procedure that's common in the fertility industry, but again,

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Speaker 1: it's not typically used for women that are young and

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Speaker 1: in good health. However, doctors told me that they felt

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Speaker 1: pressured to recommend this procedure to even young, healthy patients

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Speaker 1: in a bid to boost their quotas for the month.

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Speaker 1: And the reason that's significant for the patient is because

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Speaker 1: it's very taxing on the body and women don't really

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Speaker 1: get a break to kind of recover. But from the

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Speaker 1: company's perspective, they're able to extract more money from a

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Speaker 1: process like that, it's more costly. Doctors said that they

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Speaker 1: didn't feel comfortable kind of taking this approach, and that

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Speaker 1: the quotas were emphasized pretty frequently throughout the year, and

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Speaker 1: that that pressure has just become more intense as the

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Speaker 1: company marches toward an IPO.

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Speaker 2: And what did kind body say about all of this?

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Speaker 1: Kind body pointed to the fact that quotas are not

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Speaker 1: uncommon in the industry, which is true. They said that

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Speaker 1: they left the discretion of what procedures to recommend to

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Speaker 1: patients up to doctors, and they disputed the fact that

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Speaker 1: they ever pressured clinicians, nurse practitioners included, to ever do

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Speaker 1: anything that they didn't want to do.

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Speaker 2: Jackie, we've been talking about the mistakes that happen in

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Speaker 2: these labs. But what is kind body's success rate?

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Speaker 1: So its overall life birth success rate is about the

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Speaker 1: sixty three percent, and that's compared to a national average

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Speaker 1: of about forty three percent as reported to the Society

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Speaker 1: of Assisted Reproductive Technology.

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Speaker 2: That would seem like a pretty good number for them

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Speaker 2: to tout.

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Speaker 1: It is, and it does show that they're able to

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Speaker 1: be effective at helping people start a family, you know,

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Speaker 1: and that could be for a variety of reasons, the

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Speaker 1: types of treatment that they're doing that might be different

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Speaker 1: from other clinics. That also has a lot to do

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Speaker 1: with the people and the population that they're serving. So

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Speaker 1: it's kind of hard to compare apples to apples, And

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Speaker 1: some folks look at live success rates, but some experts

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Speaker 1: say that it's not a perfect point of comparison because

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Speaker 1: someone in Missouri, their demographic might look totally different than

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Speaker 1: those success rates of New York because people in Missouri

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Speaker 1: might be starting families at a younger age, and then

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Speaker 1: therefore they have a better chance versus a woman in

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Speaker 1: New York who might be in her forties and therefore

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Speaker 1: having a lower chance of conceiving. So it's not a

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Speaker 1: perfect number, but certainly one that kind Body is proud

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Speaker 1: of and they deserve credit for.

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Speaker 2: And we've been talking about regulation of this industry, but

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Speaker 2: this is one number that the government really does pay

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Speaker 2: attention to.

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Speaker 1: Yes, and the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology has over

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Speaker 1: four hundred member clinics that report data to that organization,

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Speaker 1: and then those numbers are then fed up to the

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Speaker 1: Centers for Disease Control. So the government does track this

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Speaker 1: to a degree. What they're not really doing is enforcing

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Speaker 1: the standards and the protocols for how these IVF labs operate.

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Speaker 2: When we come back, what's next for kind Body, Jackie?

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Speaker 2: As you said at the beginning, this company has big

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Speaker 2: plans for its future. Where are they headed right now?

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Speaker 1: They've been very open and transparent about the fact that

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00:24:32,960 --> 00:24:36,680
Speaker 1: they're looking to go public and that their last capital

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00:24:36,760 --> 00:24:39,639
Speaker 1: raise was the last one for twenty twenty three, that

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00:24:39,720 --> 00:24:42,600
Speaker 1: they want to take the next step and go public

390
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Speaker 1: as a company, and in doing that, they're opening up

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Speaker 1: more clinics in Texas, in Bethesda in Maryland, and also

392
00:24:52,400 --> 00:24:55,760
Speaker 1: looking to get new contracts from the employer benefit space,

393
00:24:55,960 --> 00:24:58,800
Speaker 1: going after some of these corporate clients that are looking

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Speaker 1: to offer for to as a perk for their employees.

395
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Speaker 1: And they're doing a good job of expanding in places

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Speaker 1: where you would expect to see a soul cycle or

397
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Speaker 1: a dry bar in these metropolitan areas.

398
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Speaker 2: Our investors in the company aware of some of the

399
00:25:16,760 --> 00:25:18,200
Speaker 2: things in your reporting.

400
00:25:18,320 --> 00:25:21,760
Speaker 1: They're not aware of the full extent of the types

401
00:25:21,800 --> 00:25:26,040
Speaker 1: of mistakes that have occurred. They said things like mistakes

402
00:25:26,040 --> 00:25:30,960
Speaker 1: happen at any startup, that growing pains can occur, and

403
00:25:31,000 --> 00:25:33,920
Speaker 1: that when it comes to opening a brick and mortar clinic,

404
00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:35,720
Speaker 1: there is a lot of risks that come with that,

405
00:25:35,840 --> 00:25:40,119
Speaker 1: but they're very confident in the company's ability to weather that.

406
00:25:40,520 --> 00:25:43,879
Speaker 1: And a big reason for that is because the company's

407
00:25:44,040 --> 00:25:48,680
Speaker 1: former CEO, who founded the company, Gina Bartazzi. She ended

408
00:25:48,760 --> 00:25:52,680
Speaker 1: up taking a role as executive chairman when the company

409
00:25:52,720 --> 00:25:57,199
Speaker 1: went through the merger with Bio's Fertility Institute, and that

410
00:25:57,359 --> 00:26:01,520
Speaker 1: was the merger that really expanded their footprint across the country. Now,

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00:26:01,920 --> 00:26:05,560
Speaker 1: investors say that she's still fairly involved at the company.

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00:26:05,680 --> 00:26:09,720
Speaker 1: She does the investor calls, and she's a big reason

413
00:26:09,800 --> 00:26:13,080
Speaker 1: why they remain so confident. She has the experience in

414
00:26:13,119 --> 00:26:17,760
Speaker 1: fertility and with her somewhat at the helm that the

415
00:26:17,840 --> 00:26:20,920
Speaker 1: company is really able to get to the next level.

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Speaker 2: I imagine other IVF companies are watching kind Body, Are

417
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Speaker 2: any of them starting to change the way they do

418
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Speaker 2: business to be more like kind Body.

419
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Speaker 1: The fertility tech sector has really boomed over the last

420
00:26:35,600 --> 00:26:40,440
Speaker 1: few years, and in twenty twenty two, these startups raised

421
00:26:40,720 --> 00:26:44,520
Speaker 1: over eight hundred million dollars in venture capital funding, and

422
00:26:44,560 --> 00:26:48,359
Speaker 1: that's one indicator that shows investors are really eager to

423
00:26:48,440 --> 00:26:51,920
Speaker 1: capitalize on the growth in this space and more companies

424
00:26:52,000 --> 00:26:54,080
Speaker 1: not just like kind Body that are starting brick and

425
00:26:54,119 --> 00:26:58,080
Speaker 1: mortar clinics, but also looking to other aspects of the industry,

426
00:26:58,440 --> 00:27:02,720
Speaker 1: whether that's how you track data or people looking to

427
00:27:02,760 --> 00:27:04,679
Speaker 1: be more of the middleman and kind of serving as

428
00:27:04,680 --> 00:27:08,120
Speaker 1: a marketplace for fertility benefit. So across the board you're

429
00:27:08,119 --> 00:27:11,600
Speaker 1: seeing fertility tech startups starting to sprout. Kind Body is

430
00:27:11,640 --> 00:27:15,320
Speaker 1: really one of a kind in that it owns and

431
00:27:15,440 --> 00:27:18,440
Speaker 1: operates its own clinics, and you don't see very many

432
00:27:18,480 --> 00:27:21,639
Speaker 1: startups doing that because it's so hard to do that.

433
00:27:21,720 --> 00:27:26,760
Speaker 1: It's capital intensive, it's expensive, and it requires a lot

434
00:27:26,800 --> 00:27:30,400
Speaker 1: of expertise to set up these IVF labs. It's expensive

435
00:27:30,400 --> 00:27:32,560
Speaker 1: to staff them as well. So kind Body is kind

436
00:27:32,560 --> 00:27:35,000
Speaker 1: of an outlier in that way that they're really undertaking

437
00:27:35,280 --> 00:27:38,480
Speaker 1: this approach in the industry, this vertically integrated model.

438
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Speaker 2: As you continue to report on the story, what are

439
00:27:41,160 --> 00:27:41,760
Speaker 2: you watching for?

440
00:27:42,480 --> 00:27:46,160
Speaker 1: The global fertility market was worth about thirty five billion

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Speaker 1: last year and it's expected to grow to eighty four

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Speaker 1: billion by twenty twenty eight. The US is a large

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Speaker 1: portion of this, and you have other countries like France

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Speaker 1: and the UK putting up more regulations around how you

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Speaker 1: track mistakes, what types of practices are mandated by law

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Speaker 1: in an IVF lab, And what I'll be looking out

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Speaker 1: for is to see which government agencies start to take

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Speaker 1: more control of the standards and practices in embryology and

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Speaker 1: IVF flaps in general in the US.

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Speaker 2: Jackie, thanks for sharing your reporting, Thank you, thanks for

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Speaker 2: listening to us here at the Big Take. It's a

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Speaker 2: daily podcast from Bloomberg and iHeartRadio for more shows from iHeartRadio,

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Speaker 2: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen,

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Speaker 2: and we'd love to hear from you. Email us questions

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Speaker 2: or comments to Big Take at Bloomberg dot net. The

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Speaker 2: supervising producer of The Big Take is Vicky Ergalina. Our

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Speaker 2: senior producer is Catherine Fink. This episode was produced by

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Speaker 2: Sam Gobauer and Jilda Decarli. Jil de Garcia is our engineer.

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Speaker 2: Our original music was composed by Leo Sidrin. I'm wes Kasova.

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Speaker 2: We'll be back tomorrow with another Big Take dot the

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Speaker 2: County to the Don Poking better