The 3 Things That Have Been Holding Back the Fertility Business

Carrot Fertility CEO Tammy Sun and Modern Fertility chief Afton Vechery discuss what's been holding back the fertility industry—and what the future holds.

The fertility business is in the midst of a revolution—and a pair of prominent CEOs in the space have some thoughts on why it’s taken so long for the industry to catch up with current trends.

At Fortune‘s Most Powerful Women Next Gen 2019 conference in Laguna Niguel on Wednesday, Afton Vechery, who founded Modern Fertility with the goal of adapting family planning to, well, the modern era, cited three important reasons for this disconnect—and how it’s led to the rise of the “fertility,” rather than “infertility” industry:

• Millennials are “waiting longer than any other generation in the U.S.” to start their families.
• 20% of millennials identify as LGBTQA, making the process of creating a family longer and more complicated.
• While sectors like beauty and fitness have seen massive gains in tech to keep up with consumers’ lifestyles and demand for data, it’s not mainstream for people to collect their own fertility data until there’s an issue.

“Women are demanding more information about their biology so they can make the decisions that are right from them,” said Vechery. Modern Fertility describes itself as a company that can guide people through their questions about fertility hormones with the help of quizzes, lab tests, and doctors.

Tammy Sun, the CEO of Carrot Fertility, added that there’s a fundamental shift in how companies and society at large view fertility insurance coverage.

“One of the biggest myths is that only large tech companies can afford or want fertility benefits,” she said. “We have customers in food and beverage and many other industries. Fertility was very much considered a luxury consumer good.” Now, according to Sun, it’s a “fourth pillar” of health benefits, in addition to medical, dental, and vision care.

More must-read stories from Fortune’s MPW Next Gen Summit:

—Chanel Miller is more than “Emily Doe”
—The “blameless post mortem” and other techniques that spur innovation
—Career pivots are daunting. Here’s how three powerful women made them work
—Goldman Sachs removed one word from recruiting materials and female hires soared
—Exclusive: Enterprise scion Chrissy Taylor to become car rental giant’s CEO
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