breastfeeding
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The Bottle That Works Like a Mom, From a Team That Ran Medela
A former Medela executive and a Harvard-MBA operator spent more than a decade re-engineering the baby bottle. The pitch is simple: make the bottle behave like the breast so babies stop refusing one for the other.
The Wearable Pump That Freed Moms From the Wall Outlet
How a Shenzhen startup built the world's best-selling wearable breast pump, then turned one gadget into a whole aisle of motherhood.
Willow Innovations, Inc.
Willow Innovations is a U.S. femtech company that invented the first all-in-one, in-bra wearable breast pump, freeing new mothers from cords, tubes and the pumping room. Founded in 2014 out of Josh Makower's ExploraMed incubator, Willow now sells app-controlled, leak-proof pumps (Willow 360, Willow Go, Willow Sync and the manual Willow Wave) along with a growing line of feeding and postpartum accessories. In 2025 it acquired UK rival Elvie to build a scaled maternal-health platform.
SimpliFed
SimpliFed is a virtual maternal health company based in Ithaca, New York, that helps families through pregnancy, postpartum, and baby feeding. Founded by biomedical engineer Andrea Ippolito in 2019, it began as insurance-covered virtual lactation support and has grown into a broader 'Maternal Health Operating System' (mOS) that pairs IBCLC lactation consultants and care navigators with prenatal and postpartum virtual OB services. Working in-network with most major commercial plans and Medicaid in multiple states, SimpliFed partners with health systems and OB clinics to extend judgment-free, evidence-based care into the home.