Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Fortune’s Best Companies to Work For list features two women-led companies in the top 10, the Biden administration is investing in repurposing coal mines, and Fortune’s Maria Aspan reports on the big business problems for birth control companies. Have a great day!
– Birth control fail. Ten years ago, Saundra Pelletier joined what became Evofem Biosciences, a small pharma company focusing on women’s health. A passionate, tireless CEO—and a savvy, feminist marketer—Pelletier spent the next seven years in expensive regulatory limbo, fighting for FDA approval for Evofem’s first and only product. Finally, in 2020, Evofem was able to launch that drug, a nonhormonal contraceptive gel called Phexxi.
Today, more than 100,000 women have gotten prescriptions for Phexxi–but Evofem is still on the brink of failure. “We are on life support,” Pelletier acknowledges. “We will do anything to survive outside of bankruptcy.”
Some of Evofem’s problems are of Pelletier’s own making, as I report in a feature investigation that Fortune published today. But the worst body blows to its business came from the broken health care system—and the damage extends far beyond one small drugmaker.
More than 47 million U.S. women use contraceptives, and doctors and patients alike say there’s a real need for innovation in birth control (especially in the post-Roe v. Wade era). But most investors and big companies have largely abandoned women’s health, leaving contraception to small, scrappy specialists including Evofem and Agile Therapeutics. Now there’s a particularly infuriating—and damaging—financial problem facing these companies: They can’t get big insurance companies to pay for their products, despite a federal law requiring insurers to do so.
“It’s pretty bad—and it’s just rampant,” says Mara Gandal-Powers, director of birth control access and senior counsel for the National Women’s Law Center. “Health insurance companies are not covering newer products the way they’re supposed to.”
The Biden Administration says it is “actively investigating” reports of insurer noncompliance (while the insurers and their pharmacy benefit managers generally say they are working to comply with the law). Any government action would help the 73 million U.S. women of reproductive age, for whom access to reproductive health care is more important than ever. And in a best-case scenario, stricter enforcement might even lead to more and better contraceptive options for women. But it may not come quickly enough to save Evofem–or to encourage other companies to innovate in this crucial, if widely overlooked, market.
Pelletier isn’t giving up, even as her company has laid off most of its staff and effectively put itself up for sale. But it’s hard to be optimistic about the systemic hurdles facing her industry, and how they restrict the health care available to more than half of the population. As one of Evofem’s competitors, Agile CEO Al Altomari, warns: “When an entrepreneur comes to me and says they want to start a new women’s health care company, I tell them, ‘Don’t do it.’”
Read the full story here.
Maria Aspan
maria.aspan@fortune.com
@mariaaspan
The Broadsheet is Fortune’s newsletter for and about the world’s most powerful women. Today’s edition was curated by Kinsey Crowley. Subscribe here.
ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
- Best Companies to Work For. Fortune's list of the 100 Best Companies to Work For features two companies in the top 10 with women CEOs. Ranked fourth is Wegmans Food Markets, led by Colleen Wegman, which has appeared on the list since 1998 because of the company's dedication to employee opportunity and education reimbursement. Accenture, led by CEO Julie Sweet, landed at No. 5 on the list for its new mental health programs and continued apprenticeship opportunities. Fortune
- Charges against Frank. Charlie Javice, founder of student financial aid startup Frank, was charged with fraud for allegedly misrepresenting the business's customer base when selling it for $175 million to JPMorgan Chase. She was also sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission for fraud. Javice has denied the allegations. Fortune
- Win for abortion rights. Janet Protasiewicz won the Wisconsin Supreme Court race last night, tipping the majority to liberals for the first time in 15 years. The court is likely to overturn the state’s pre-Civil War abortion ban, reconsider a lawsuit over the Republican-drawn legislative maps, and play a key role in the 2024 presidential election. Wisconsin Public Radio
MOVERS AND SHAKERS: Denise Karkos is now chief e-commerce officer at Dick's Sporting Goods. Alexandra Traber McNamara will be chief corporate affairs and communications officer at Girl Scouts of the USA. Gayle Sheppard has been named CEO of Bright Machines. Former Match Group CEO Mandy Ginsberg is joining the board of Noom.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
- First fund. Värde Partners cofounder Marcia Page started MPowered Capital to back women and minority alternative-asset managers. MPowered just closed its first round at $110 million, and Page called its progress part of a "long-term arc" to close the capital gap. Bloomberg
- Underdog. Occidental Petroleum CEO Vicki Hollub became the first woman to lead a major oil and gas company in 2016. She fought a bitter battle to acquire Anadarko and gave shareholders the greatest returns of any S&P 500 company last year, as she shares in the latest episode of Fortune's Leadership Next podcast. Fortune
- Coal mines repurposed. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm has announced that the Biden administration is allocating $450 million from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to develop new clean energy projects in former coal mines. She aims to use existing infrastructure for initiatives like microgrid development and nuclear power generation while bringing economic opportunity to coal mining communities. CNBC
ON MY RADAR
Chlöe Bailey is in her healing era Cosmopolitan
The shared anti-trans and anti-abortion playbook Intelligencer
Stormy Daniels on the Trump indictment and what really happened in that Nevada hotel room Vogue
Brooke Shields and the curse of great beauty New York Times
PARTING WORDS
"It’s really sexy and cool to be a venture investor right now or an investor, period. We are kind of trying to keep our heads down, work really closely with our founders and then you’ll see it when it’s successful."
–Sara Foster, partner at Oversubscribed Ventures, on making waves as a woman in VC
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