Press Release
Announcing winners of The Equalizer Challenge
03 July 2025
UNFPA Announces Winners of the Equalizer Challenge to Scale Breakthrough Women’s Health Innovations. Winners include an AI health tracker for pregnant women, a digital menopause platform and a speculum that detects cervical cancer.
New York, 3 July 2025 - UNFPA, the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency, today announced the six winners of the Equalizer Challenge: Scaling Women’s Health Innovations. The initiative supports women-led health enterprises in moving beyond the pilot stage and achieving transformative impact at scale.
Launched in collaboration with MIT Solve, IE University, and Women of Wearables, and enabled by generous support from the Governments of Luxembourg and Germany, the challenge seeks to close the gender health gap by investing in innovations that reach the most underserved.
The six winners were selected from 350 submissions across 72 countries, with entries spanning six global regions. Each will receive up to US$ 20,000 in catalytic equity-free funding, along with a six-month capacity development programme that includes biweekly mentorship, expert coaching, and strategic connections to global health and investment networks.
The selected innovations address a wide range of women’s health challenges, including cervical cancer, menopause, maternal mental health, and digital access to sexual and reproductive health care.
The six winning solutions are:
- GICMED (Cameroon) – A smart gynecological speculum device that enables early detection and remote diagnosis of cervical cancer and female genital schistosomiasis through telemedicine in low-resource settings.
- Take Care Mom (Kazakhstan) – An AI-powered platform providing pregnant women with continuous health tracking, early risk detection, and 24/7 expert support to improve maternal and neonatal health and well-being.
- Maisha Mothers (Kenya) – A mobile-based maternal health innovation by Thalia Psychotherapy that integrates mental health, family planning, and financial wellness into routine antenatal and postnatal care.
- OMGYNO (Lebanon) – A femtech platform offering anonymous at-home testing, telemedicine services, and sexual and reproductive health education for women in underserved communities across the Middle East and North Africa.
- SinReglas (Mexico) – A digital menopause platform, offering personalized care and workplace services responsive to the health needs of millions of women during all stages of their life cycle, including menopause.
- Smart Scope® CX (India) – An AI-powered portable device from Periwinkle Technologies that enables community health care workers to detect early-stage cervical cancer and certain benign conditions within 60 seconds without the need for electricity or internet, and facilitates remote triaging.
These women-led solutions were selected for their scale potential and demonstrated impact. The Equalizer Challenge shows UNFPA’s commitment to supporting women-centric health solutions by closing funding gaps, and helping them develop, gain visibility, and reach the market.Through targeted innovation challenges, UNFPA transforms community-led innovations into high-impact, investable solutions spearheaded by women and young people.
UNFPA Press Contact: media@unfpa.org
Disclaimer: UNFPA is providing support for the Equalizer Challenge with a view to furthering the development and availability of women’s health innovations. UNFPA has not or may not have evaluated, assessed, or tested the innovative solutions or products included or presented in this Challenge. In particular, the inclusion or presentation of any solution or product in this Challenge does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by UNFPA.
