Women-led venture firm joins existing investors to accelerate growth of AI-powered brain health platform for women

PHOENIX, March 26, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Prickly Pear Health, a digital health company focused on women’s brain health, announced today that it has expanded its pre-seed funding to more than $600,000 following a follow-on investment round that includes participation from existing investors and a new strategic partner, Emmeline Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on improving women’s health outcomes.

The partnership highlights a growing coalition of investors supporting innovations designed to address longstanding gaps in women’s healthcare. The latest funding builds on the previously announced backing from Bayless Ventures and AZ Venture Capital Inc., positioning the startup for its next phase of growth.

“I founded Prickly Pear Health to address a critical blind spot in women’s healthcare: how hormonal changes impact brain health,” said Imen Maaroufi Clark, founder and CEO of Prickly Pear Health. “This round reflects a powerful coalition of partners who believe that women deserve better tools to understand what’s happening in their brains during life transitions.”

Despite the growing number of companies launched by women, female founders continue to face significant barriers in venture funding. In 2024, female-only founding teams received just 2.3% of global venture capital funding, while 83.6% went to all-male teams. Companies founded by women accounted for 6.4% of all venture deals but received only a fraction of total capital, highlighting the funding gap that persists across the startup ecosystem.

Emmeline Ventures’ investment underscores the firm’s strategy of supporting founders building companies that improve outcomes across women’s health. This is the firm’s first investment in an Arizona-based company, reinforcing the region’s growing reputation as a hub for health innovation. The backing reflects a broader shift toward supporting an industry that has historically been underfunded, despite its affecting billions of people worldwide.

“We invest in founders who are building meaningful solutions that advance women’s health while creating strong businesses,” said Azin Radsan van Alebeek, Co-founder and General Partner at Emmeline Ventures. “Prickly Pear Health represents a compelling intersection of technology, data, and an underserved market opportunity.”

Prickly Pear Health plans to use this new funding to accelerate user growth and expand platform deployments with mental health practices, beginning in Arizona. Since its founding in 2024, the digital platform has surpassed 2,000 active users in its current phase and continues to develop ahead of a broader public launch.

The platform uses AI, voice analysis, and behavioral data to help women understand how hormonal fluctuations influence cognitive and emotional health, including symptoms such as brain fog, stress, and memory changes during hormonal transitions. Prickly Pear’s approach focuses on proactive brain health, combining voice data patterns with lifestyle and wearable data to deliver personalized insights that support emotional resilience and cognitive performance. The platform is designed to support women across multiple hormonal phases, including pregnancy, postpartum, irregular cycles, perimenopause, and the menopausal transition.

The digital brain health market is projected to exceed $412 billion by 2032, while the broader women’s health market could surpass $1 trillion globally, with hormonal health alone estimated at $600 billion. Hormonal care affects more than 2 billion women worldwide, but is often overlooked, underfunded, and under-researched.

By focusing specifically on women’s brain health, Prickly Pear Health aims to build a new category within digital health that bridges hormonal science, behavioral data, and personalized technology across the hormonal health continuum. You can learn more about Prickly Pear Health at https://pricklypear.io/.

About Prickly Pear Health

Prickly Pear is a NextGen digital health solution designed to champion brain health during and beyond reproductive years. By integrating voice AI, behavioral analytics, and wearable technology, the platform delivers personalized insights to support emotional well-being, mental clarity, and cognitive resilience, particularly for women with ongoing hormonal changes and fluctuations. By fostering sustainable lifestyle modifications, the platform empowers them to fuel cognitive performance and optimize overall well-being. To learn more, visit https://pricklypear.io/.

About Emmeline Ventures

Emmeline Ventures invests in solutions that help women manage their health, build their wealth and live in a cleaner, safer world. The firm targets overlooked, high-upside markets, backing companies at the intersection of essential innovation and large-scale demand. Leveraging deep operational experience, the Emmeline team partners closely with founders to reduce early-stage risk and accelerate growth toward institutional scale. With a focused, thesis-driven strategy, Emmeline Ventures invests in high-conviction opportunities that deliver both strong financial returns and meaningful real-world impact. To learn more, visit https://www.emmelineventures.vc.