Women's Health Innovation,Ventures & Access in the Nordics

WHIVA Nordic brings together leading life science ecosystems in Sweden, Denmark and Norway to create a Nordic model designed to simplify market entry and scaling for women’s health innovations.

Women’s health remains one of the most underserved areas of healthcare innovation. Despite affecting half of the population, women have historically been underrepresented in research and clinical studies, creating significant gaps in diagnosis, treatment and innovation. At the same time, startups and SMEs developing solutions for women’s health often face additional challenges related to commercialization and market entry.

WHIVA Nordic will establish a unified cross-border commercialisation pathway that combines regulatory strategy, clinical documentation, and market access support across Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. The aim is to support 45 women’s health startups and SMEs in navigating regulatory, clinical, commercial and investment challenges. For at least 20-23 companies, this is expected to result in new or significantly improved products or processes.

Beyond supporting individual companies, WHIVA Nordic also aims to strengthen the Nordic ecosystem by connecting entrepreneurs, investors, healthcare professionals, researchers and innovation organisations around a shared ambition: bringing more women’s health innovations to the people who need them.

Medicon Valley Alliance (MVA) serves as the lead partner of WHIVA Nordic and is responsible for overall project management, communication, partner coordination, financial management, and reporting to Interreg. MVA also ensures that the contributions from all project partners are integrated into one coherent cross-border commercialization pathway for women’s health companies. In addition, MVA leverages its existing Women’s Health Network to provide participating companies with access to relevant expertise, stakeholders, and investors across the region.

Open calls and tailored support

The participating companies will be selected through open calls and receive tailored support in one or more areas:

• Regulatory planning
• Clinical evidence and validation
• Business development
• Market positioning
• Investor readiness
• Partnerships and routes to market

Each participating company will complete an initial assessment and receive a plan outlining its next steps.

The first call is expected to open in November 2026 and close in January 2027.

Project partners

Denmark: Medicon Valley Alliance (lead), Technical University of Denmark, Health Tech Hub Copenhagen, TÜV SÜD Denmark

Sweden: SmiLe Venture Hub

Norway: The Life Science Cluster

Associated partners include Almi Invest Syd, Angella Invest, BioInnovation Institute, BioStock, Greater Copenhagen, Innovation Skåne, Medeon Science Park, Skåne University Hospital,  Technical University Hospital of Greater Copenhagen, WILD Denmark, WILD Norway, WILD Finland and Vilda in Sweden.

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