Business Insight

Digital Healthcare

How a Singapore-Based Fertility, Reproductive and Family Healthcare Company Pioneered in Asia

May Jang

July 30, 2024

The Asia-Pacific(APAC) fertility services market is projected to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 15.2%, reaching approximately $12.3 billion by the end of 2027.

An even more optimistic forecast suggests that the APAC fertility services market size could grow to $20.49 billion by 2030, with a CAGR of 15.5%.

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In the evolving Asian fertility market, Zora Health stands as a pioneering B2B fertility, reproductive and family healthcare platform for every life stage.

Emerging when fertility services were largely unknown and taboo, Zora Health now has more room to innovate as awareness improves and fertility rates decline. As Asia's leading platform, Zora Health integrates corporations providing employment benefits with over 80 clinics in more than 16 countries to simplify and enhance accessibility to healthcare.

“Why does Zora Health provide mainly B2B services? How did they acquire corporate clients after the pivot? What kind of problem do they want to solve aligned with the governments and other partners? What’s their value proposition? What’s their strategies to go to the APAC market?”

Zora Health's goal is clear: to become the company that inspires Asian societies by initiating free and open-minded conversations about fertility, reproductive and family healthcare related topics. To do so, it's working hard on developing its competitive edge and delivering its value proposition to the market.

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We met Benjamin Lum Jun Ying, Global Partnerships & Sales Manager at Zora Health, to learn more about the details of their journey. He explained how they established their healthcare business step by step, what the market and regulations around fertility services are like, and their strategies for global expansion. Furthermore, he gave advice for young entrepreneurs in Asia as someone who has been in the challenging healthcare industry for quite a while. So don't miss it!

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Not the Easiest Journey to becoming a B2B Company

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Q. Could you introduce Zora Health in detail?

We are Asia’s leading fertility, reproductive and family healthcare company. We support all genders and all ages at any life stage ranging from fertility, sexual health, menstrual health to family building and beyond by providing a one stop platform as employment benefits for corporations.

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In addition to providing fertility services through our partners, we also hold health talks and workshops for our corporate clients. These are often introduced to senior management at the client corporations. While this might be new to some, more leaders want to make their companies more inclusive.

Aiming to become the one-stop platform for fertility, reproductive, and family healthcare for corporations, we even offer workshops for employees of our clients who have returned from maternity and paternity leave to help them adjust back to their workplace. Supporting all life stages, we also help employees manage menopause and andropause symptoms.

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Q. Why do you provide the service B2B, in addition to B2C?

Actually, we started as a B2C platform. We tested the hypothesis that there was a need for this service, and we successfully created a stream of patients. Our patients then started to ask us if we offered the service via employers as a benefit. We were also thinking about how we could expand our accessibility.

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Q. How did you acquire the first corporate clients?

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I believe there are a few things that founders should prioritize, especially when pivoting from a B2C startup to a B2B startup in the healthcare industry.

Firstly, think about distribution channels. Especially for B2B startups, the channel can be the breakthrough for attracting clients and establishing revenue streams.

Secondly, hiring the right team that understands the B2B healthcare industry landscape with the right connections is essential to secure distribution channels and clients. Having a team who is skilled at acquiring these partnerships or has extensive experience and connections with these players will help tremendously.

Thirdly, we need to improve the awareness of potential clients when we meet with them. When you start out, your services are still unfamiliar to potential clients. In our case, such healthcare in Asia is still several years behind other markets. So it's not only about conveying our value proposition to clients or partners but also about educating them about Zora Health, which aims to disrupt a space that is slow-paced and needs much innovation. These days, it's much easier than before, as awareness has improved.

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Q. What is the value proposition of Zora Health?

‍We help employers improve the productivity of their workforces. Up to thirty five percent (35%) of time spent in the workplace is used by employees looking for solutions to family healthcare issues. We see a significant opportunity cost there for employers.

Zora Health tackles this issue by allowing employees easy access to fertility, reproductive, and family healthcare support and encouraging them to take proactive and preventative measures to address their health. When they can get the right support from us, clients and employers can see a significant increase in productivity.

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For individual customers, our support can help them with the right care at the right time. We've spoken to hundreds of people, and they said that the No. 1 trouble in fertility health is that they have difficulty accessing verified information and the right type of care.

For many healthcare services in Asia, it takes weeks to schedule an appointment. Often, customers wait weeks and even months to see the specialist, only to have their questions left unanswered as they often fall outside the scope of the appointment. Zora Health’s Care Advocates bring answers, comfort and options to customers in a fraction of the time.

We also provide additional support, such as a self-guided education platform where employees can educate themselves on different conditions and diverse lifestyles, and a curated marketplace for access to a suite of products and services like supplements, tests, and so on.

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External Environment around Zora Health - Regulations, Fertility Rates and Market Trend

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Q. What’s the regulations around IVF and egg freezing like in Singapore?

Yes. There has been a positive change in regulation. Last year, Singapore legalized elective egg freezing. The age limit was also raised from 35 to 37, making it more accessible. IVF (in vitro fertilization) has remained available only for married couples, so a marriage certificate is required, which is also seen across Asia.

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Q. We are seeing severely decreasing fertility rates. Who do you think should be part of the solution?

It is a team effort as we see everyone as part of the ecosystem. This means that corporations and insurers should play an important role including governments.

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People spend most of their time at work, so corporations are a key stakeholder. Insurance companies can innovate to include fertility treatments in their policies rather than as an exclusion or requiring additional underwriting, for maternity insurance.

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Q. Then are there many corporations who provide fertility service as employment benefits in real life?

We are seeing greater awareness in this area in the Asian market. Most corporations who have such employment benefits are often big tech companies, financial institutions and pharmaceutical companies to attract talent. Other industries are now catching up and looking to offer such benefits; though they are mainly for reimbursement of treatment.

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With Strategies, Having Become APAC Startup

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Q. What was it like when you joined the team?

I joined the team relatively early. We already had the programmer who developed our platform, and a product manager joined the team with me.

Then, there were debates around how to refine the product, how we could create value for the partners, and which partners were needed. So it was important for us, as a small team, to understand our roles. In my case, I was focusing on revenue generation to bring in new business and partners.

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Q. What is your strategy for APAC?

Western markets are ahead when it comes to fertility, reproductive health and family healthcare services as employment benefits.It's because the way providers operate and the way in which workforces view such healthcare topics differs in the Asian market. Having this understanding is what allowed us to better support our clients and partners.

Cross border referrals for our partner clinics are also common. So we made our concierge service easily accessible to facilitate treatment both locally and abroad.

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Goal for Zora Health and Advice for Young Entrepreneurs

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Q. What’s your short-term and long-term goal?

The short-term goal of Zora Health is to be the leading platform in Asia. What we want to do is to aggregate the resources for everyone regardless of where the corporations are. Hope they can come to us to provide these employment benefits as they see us as the most verifiable service to support anything in fertility, reproductive and family healthcare.

Our long-term goal is to remove the stigma and stereotypes surrounding conversations on topics surrounding fertility, reproductive health and family building particularly in workplaces. In Asia, fertility issues are still taboo, which deepens the struggle.

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Q. Healthcare industry is a hard sector to penetrate. Could you give advice for young Asian entrepreneurs who are considering starting a business in this sector?

My number one advice is to have friends in this field to rally around you. It can be investors, advisors or mentors. Your journey will not be easy. However, if your friends believe in you as a person and believe in your vision, stick with them and it will be the best thing you can do as a young founder.

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Written by May Jang

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