Anja Health Raises $4.5M Seed Funding Round to Help Pregnant Parents Get a Stem Cell Safe For Their Umbilical Cord and Placenta

Alexis Ohanian's Seven Seven Six Led The Round to Help Grow Anja Health's Personalized Doctor-Backed Cord Blood Banking Platform

LOS ANGELES, May 9, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Anja Health, the personalized doctor-backed cord blood banking company, today announced a $4.5M seed funding round led by Alexis Ohanian's Seven Seven Six with participation from Harvest Ventures and Crista Galli Ventures, in addition to prominent executives including Cleo Abram, Chris Ovitz of Electric Ant, Balaji Srinivisan, Zachariah Reitano – CEO and founder of Ro, and Tim Lenardo – CEO and founder of JetFuel. Through this strategic investment, Anja Health will accelerate its mission to make cord blood stem cell banking more accessible and affordable for all – regardless of race, socioeconomic status or income. The company will use the new financing to bolster its executive team, drive strategic growth, and continue to foster its community and reach and inform all parents-to-be.

"Far too many parents lack knowledge or access to quality health care. At Anja, we're working to ensure that all parents have an equitable experience and that their umbilical cords and placentas don't go to waste - as most do today," says Kathryn Cross, Founder of Anja Health. "I am grateful to have Seven Seven Six –  as I have always admired his platform surrounding parents' rights, which aligns with Anja Health's mission of empowering parents to make more informed choices about their baby's health," says Cross. "Anja Health is on a mission to democratize access to not only stem cells, but information on birth in general."

Today's process of finding a cord blood match is difficult -- especially for people of color. Anja Health has revolutionized this pain point, one that founder Kathryn Cross knows personally as she experienced the hurdles of finding a match for her brother who suffered from cerebral palsy and eventually passed away. As Kathryn's parents searched for an umbilical cord blood match for her brother, they ran into many hurdles. Both Kathryn and her brother are half-Asian, which made it  difficult to find a match as matching is ethnicity based, and most of today's donors are white, and populated in high-income areas. This journey inspired Kathryn's passion for Anja Health, which led her to share videos on TikTok about cord blood banking. With millions of views on her videos and questions flooding the comments section, Kathryn knew she had found her calling to create an approachable platform to cord blood banking that prioritizes the user experience and accessibility.

"At Seven Seven Six, we especially love funding companies that align with our values of equity and compassion," said Seven Seven Six founder, Alexis Ohanian. "Anja Health does just that. Between their commitment to democratizing and creating affordable access to cord blood banking and their focus on the future of healthcare solutions."

The FDA currently approves cord blood as a treatment for certain lymphomas, solid tumors, anemias, inherited red cell abnormalities, leukemias, inherited immune system disorders, bone marrow cancers, and inherited metabolic disorders, but cord tissue and placenta stem cells have also been used within studies and clinical trials to treat acquired hearing loss, autism, cerebral palsy, congenital heart defects and more. The process of Anja Health is simple. The company sends soon-to-be parents a kit leading up to their birth experience. Immediately after birth, your baby's umbilical cord is clamped and cut, but Anja Health's offering is also compatible with up to 2 minutes of delayed cord clamping. Once you call the number on our collection kit to alert our shipping team that you've given birth, a medical courier picks up the collection kit from wherever you are in the United States and speedily delivers it to a lab within 72 hours or less. Necessary processing is carried out, and cord blood, cord tissue, and placenta stem cells are stored in a liquid nitrogen. For more information about Anja Health, please visit online at www.anjahealth.com or on Instagram @anja.health.

ABOUT ANJA HEALTH

Personalized doctor-backed cord blood bank that freezes umbilical cord and placenta's stem cells for future disease treatment purposes. Anja Health creates accessible health care for new moms through their affordable cord blood banking packages starting at $35 a month. Founder Kathryn Cross launched Anja Health after her own personal experience where cord blood banking could have saved her brother after being diagnosed at a very young age with cerebral palsy. Anja manual processing leads to almost 25% more stem cells being recovered and up to 80% less red blood cells contaminating the sample. All providers have over 50 years of experience processing blood products and they are FDA approved and AABB accredited lab storage. For more information about Anja Health, please visit online at www.anjahealth.com, on Instagram @anja.health or Tiktok KathrynAnja.

SOURCE Anja Health