With The Aim To Close The Gender Equity Gap In Healthcare, UAE-Based Nabta Health Raises US$2 Million Pre-Series A

UAE-based femtech startup Nabta Health has bagged US$2 million in a pre-Series A round, bringing its total funding to $4.5 million as it accelerates its hybrid women’s health model across the Middle East and Africa.  

Founded by Sophie Smith in the UAE in 2017, Nabta Health blends artificial intelligence (AI)-powered digital tools with at-home and in-clinic care, aiming to redefine how women access preventive healthcare in the region. 

In an interview with Inc. Arabia, Smith, founder and CEO, Nabta Health, said the company’s newest investment reflects confidence from individuals who have been closely involved with the healthcare sector, and understand the structural gaps in women’s health across the region. “We continue to be backed exclusively by angel investors—strategic healthcare operators and small angel syndicates or family offices who understand the (largely untapped) potential of women's health,” Smith shared. “They backed us because our model isn’t theoretical anymore. Since coming out of research and development (R&D) in 2023, our clinics, research partnerships, and now our corporate health results show a system that works and is ready to scale. And the timing is right: the region wants solutions built here, for its women and its families—and it's ready to back them.” 

The new round marks a shift into a more targeted growth phase for Nabta Health as well, with the startup planning to accelerate its work with corporate clients, an area that Smith believes can reshape how preventive women’s healthcare is adopted in workplaces. According to Smith, this next step reflects a broader ambition to reframe what employers consider essential health coverage. “Our priority now is expanding our corporate client base in the UAE and making access to preventive women’s health feel less like a perk and more like an essential; the same way a Ministry of Transport test is mandatory to renew your car insurance,” she added. 

Smith also highlighted that Nabta Health has seen firsthand how this approach influences organizational well-being and productivity, especially as more companies adopt early intervention and feel the benefits of it. “When companies experience how early detection, continuity of care, and lower claims show up in their workforce, in improvements in health, happiness, and productivity, preventive care stops being a ‘nice to have,’ and becomes the obvious default,” she pointed out. 

The new funding is set to strengthen Nabta Health’s diagnostic and at-home testing pathways and deepen its collaborations with insurers, healthcare providers, and hospitals. These partnerships support the company’s hybrid care model, which pairs digital insights with clinical follow-up to manage chronic and complex conditions in women. Part of that model is a data layer that expands as more women engage with the platform. Nabta Health uses a blend of digital and traditional healthcare, combining data from its app with insights from wearables that track sleep, activity, and menstrual cycles to support early detection of chronic and complex diseases in women. 

Nabta Health then uses the data it collects to tailor its recommendations based on the health conditions, age, and reproductive goals of each woman. As Nabta Health becomes smarter and manages more data, its recommendations will increasingly be couched with a personal health score that accounts for the physical, mental, and nutritional health of each woman and her partner. 

AI sits at the center of how the company delivers this experience. Smith explained that the framework behind Nabta Health’s approach was established years before the current surge in AI adoption, shaping a system designed to support women consistently across digital and clinical touchpoints. “When we coined the term ‘Hybrid Healthcare’ back in 2018 and published a book in the same name with Springer in 2022, we conceptualized a patient-centric, decentralized healthcare system powered by an augmented intelligence—patient, clinician, and artificial intelligence—capable of providing specialized care in an affordable, mobile-first, and continuous way,” she explained. “Today, our hybrid healthcare ecosystem is operational, and AI is the thread stitching it together—from early risk identification to personalized care pathways to the continuity between clinic and home.” 

One of the key elements of Nabta Health’s larger mission is addressing the long-standing lack of representative medical data for women in the MEA. According to Smith, the company’s ecosystem is now generating datasets that reflect the health realities of women who have long been overlooked in global research. “For women in MEA who have been underserved for decades, because the data for them doesn’t exist—[they were] excluded from clinical trials until 1993; [they] still today comprise fewer than one percent of clinical trial participants—the realization of our hybrid healthcare model, designed and built by and for women in MEA, means we finally have the datasets and models that reflect women’s real physiology, symptoms, and lived experience,” she said. “For Nabta Health, AI is simply a tool to make healthcare more human, more accurate, and more preventive.” 

Beyond the clinical advantages, Smith said the economic implications are equally significant. Many employers and insurers are increasingly aware of the cost of overlooking women’s health. “When women’s health is overlooked, companies pay for it through absenteeism, late diagnoses, increases in insurance premiums, and a rise in preventable chronic conditions," she pointed out. "Closing the gender equity gap in healthcare is about more than fairness—it’s about strengthening workforces and economies, and allowing women to fulfill their potential at home and at work.” 

As Nabta Health pushes deeper into its next phase, Smith said the momentum in women’s health is opening space for more founders to build in the sector, and she offered a note for those considering the journey. “My advice to other founders is to design for the realities of women’s lives in this region; to build systems not features; to think about who is going to pay for whatever you build; and to remember that slow, evidence- and impact-driven work is what creates lasting change,” she concluded. 

Pictured in the lead image is Nabta Health founder and CEO Sophie Smith. Image courtesy Nabta Health.