St. Pete medtech startup raises $2.4M

St. Petersburg-based medtech company LunaJoy has raised $2.4 million in an oversubscribed seed investment round.

LunaJoy is a Y-combinator backed company, and calls itself the only full-stack mental health solution focused on the needs of women at each stage of their life, from pregnancy through menopause.

The company was founded by Sipra Laddha and Shama Rathi, two sisters-in-law with medical degrees in psychiatry, who joined forces in 2021 to prioritize health for women and launched an online platform.

The platform provides mental health services including medication management, therapy, group therapy and peer coaching. The launch was accelerated after LunaJoy participated in a YCombinator cohort in early 2022. LunaJoy has also participated in Tampa Bay Wave’s annual TechDiversity Accelerator program in 2022. 

“When we launched our digital clinic one year ago, we wanted to make sure women’s health issues were treated with the care, respect and seriousness it deserved and not dismissed by the medical establishment which is so often the case,” co-founder Laddha said in a news release. “Today’s raise announcement not only shows that others share the same passion for our mission, but that women of all backgrounds will get the help and care we so richly deserve.”

LunaJoy did not disclose the investors who participated in the oversubscribed seed round. The new funding, the release indicated, will allow the company to grow its user base, increase its staff and expand its geographic footprint. 

Today, LunaJoy serves over 1,000 clients via national payer contracts and relationships with clinics.  

“Women’s mental health was disproportionately affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, and we are now seeing children on our platform as young as 14,” co-founder Rathi said in a statement. “It’s important to remember that ‘one size fits all’ does not apply to mental health and that’s why this platform is timely and necessary.”