Ava Co-Founder Lea von Bidder among the Forbes 30 Under 30 2018

 

Ava, a Zurich and San Francisco based startup specialising in cycle-tracking Ava bracelet, announced that its co-founder and president Lea von Bidder was named in the annual Forbes “30 Under 30” list for 2018. Lea von Bidder is the only Swiss among the selected 600 personalities.

 

Every year Forbes presents the 30 young entrepreneurs, innovators and game changers under 30 years. Only rarely are women on th 30 under 30 list, and even more rarely are Swiss represented. This year, Lea von Bidder (27) the founder of AVA made it on the list. Also Vitalik Buterin (23) the founder of Ethereum – the Blockchain platform for developing decentralised applications, who lived in Zug for several years, was mentioned. Ethereum is supported by Ethereum Fondation, which is still based in Zug - the Cryptovalley.

Recognized in the Healthcare category, von Bidder joins an impressive group of men and women on the 2018 Forbes 30 Under 30 List, which features 600 young stars in 20 different industries. Now in its seventh year, Forbes vetted thousands of nominations to create the 2018 list, which describe as “spotlighting the impressive, the inspiring and the (genuinely) enviable.”

“This is such an honour for me. For the past three years, I’ve been working to create and advocate innovations in digital health tech that will empower women to take better control of their health and wellbeing. Being on this list with so many impressive entrepreneurs gives me hope for the future of femtech, as well as Ava specifically,” said von Bidder.

In her role with Ava, von Bidder has helped raised more than $12M in venture capital funding and expanded product sales through the US and Europe since launching in July 2016. Under her leadership, Ava has garnered coverage among top-tier media outlets including USA Today, Forbes, Wired, the Today Show and the BBC. She has spoken at CES and TechCrunch Disrupt and written several articles on issues related to female entrepreneurs and innovations in digital health for women. Prior to Ava, von Bidder co-founded L’inouï, a premium chocolate company in India. She also worked for the marketing division of Procter & Gamble in Frankfurt and for a strategy-consulting boutique in Paris. Lea holds a Master’s degree in global entrepreneurship from EM Lyon in France, Zhejiang University in China and Purdue Krannert University in the USA. She earned her Bachelor’s degree from the University of St.Gallen and HEC Montréal.

About Ava
Founded in Switzerland in 2014 by Pascal Koenig, Philipp Tholen, Peter Stein and Lea von Bidder, Ava is a medical technology company dedicated to bringing innovation to women’s reproductive health. The Ava bracelet, which received The Bump’s “Best of Baby Tech CES 2017” award for fertility and pregnancy, is the company’s first consumer product. It uses sensor technology combined with clinically tested data science to precisely detect a woman’s entire fertile window in real time. The company is also conducting clinical studies to adapt and expand its algorithms for use in pregnancy monitoring, and future use as a non-hormonal contraceptive device. Backed by $12.3M in seed and Series A funding, Ava has operations in Zurich and San Francisco.