Tiny Health, a microbiome intelligence platform, announced on Tuesday that it secured $33 million in Series B funding.
The Austin, Texas-based company offers gut microbiome tests for adults, babies and children. These provide insights on gastrointestinal issues, inflammation, eczema and allergies. In addition, it provides a vaginal microbiome test to assess sexual and reproductive health. All of these tests cost about $249, can be taken at home and come with personalized recommendations.
The Series B round was led by B Capital, with participation from Spero Ventures, The Venture City, Overwater Ventures, Black Opal Ventures, Denver Ventures, Pave Health Ventures, Alumni Ventures, Gaingels and Pari Passu Ventures. In total, Tiny Health has raised $46 million.
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“We believe the gut microbiome represents one of the most significant and underexplored frontiers in human health, and Tiny Health has built the platform best positioned to bring that science and the actionable health insights that follow to patients, providers, and partners at scale,” said Nick Whitehead, senior principal at B Capital, in a statement.
The financing will be used for clinical research and interventional studies, expanding healthcare practitioner education and advancing its AI technology. Tiny Health currently has a second randomized controlled trial underway, with its first finding that targeted microbiome interventions reduced infants’ chances of developing eczema by 83%. The company is also expanding research on irritable bowel syndrome, menopause and GLP-1s.
Tiny Health is also committing $5 million to launch the Microbiome Research Program. This will give researchers and clinicians access to Tiny Health’s microbiome testing, data and research tools to study potential treatments and interventions.
Founded in 2020, Tiny Health has served nearly 200,000 customers and more than 6,000 healthcare practitioners. The company’s founder, Cheryl Sew Hoy, created Tiny Health after her first child, born by C-section, developed eczema and a food allergy. This led her to research the microbiome and she found a gap in tools for parents to understand and support their babies’ gut health.
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Sew Hoy said she ultimately hopes to make microbiome testing the standard of care, not a specialty test. Long-term, she wants to support the transition from reactive sick care to preventive care.
“To get there, we need two things: scientific rigor and clinical utility, meaning clinicians and health practitioners are actually deriving value from what we build and it’s changing outcomes, not just generating a report,” she told MedCity News. “If we can keep both of those true as we scale, I think the gut microbiome becomes one of the foundational layers of how personalized medicine works, and Tiny Health helps set the standard for how that data gets measured and interpreted across the whole field.”
Other microbiome testing companies include Evvy and Viome.
Photo: Richard Drury, Getty Images