Health, Wellness & Biotech Startups

Why Do Health Care Startups Have The Same Names As My Human Friends?

Illustration showing reproductive health concepts on a mobile phone

In my notes app, sandwiched between a brainstorm of ice cream ideas and instructions from my physical therapist, is a list of names I began keeping since I started covering health care: Maven, Renee, Ruth, Alma, Lyra, Paige, Olive, Sami.

The original goal was to collect companies that share names with my friends. But it quickly grew beyond that.

It’s a peculiar pattern I’m seeing in health care startup names. Many of these companies share plenty of similarities: they started between 2014 and 2021. Many of them work in niche parts of the health care system, like fertility or postpartum care.

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I almost wonder if this naming strategy by so many health care startups is aimed at making those companies seem more approachable to younger people trying to navigate the health system — people who want tech-enabled care, who have experience with bias or discrimination in the health care system, or who are tired of navigating disparate, siloed entities to be treated.

I talked to Oliver Ralph, who was part of the founding team at branding agency Character, which was later sold to Dentsu Aegis Network in 2018. In 12 years, Ralph worked with companies as big as Facebook, as well as health care companies such as One Medical, Carbon Health and Ōura. He was also involved in naming Care/of, a consumer health brand.

“Many health startups have human names because they’re often focused on providing personalized and human-centered health care solutions,” Ralph said. “They are establishing a more personal and relatable brand. I think with larger health care companies, the experience can often be so impersonal.”

‘Hey, Renee’

I’ve talked to a few startups about this. Postpartum care startup Ruth Health was named, in part, after the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg.

“On the eve of RBG’s death, Alison and I called each other in tears. She said to me, ‘We will now forever be Ruth-less,’” cofounder Audrey Wu said in an email. “That was the ‘aha’ moment where we decided to name our company Ruth — in her honor and to continue carrying out the incredible work she has done for women.”

Maven means “expert” — a nod to Maven Clinic’s telehealth platform niche in fertility care.

When I was a reporter at dot.LA, I talked to Dr. Renee Dua, cofounder of the elder care startup Renee (formerly known as HeyRenee). The company specializes in personal health care for older patients who want to remain independent.

“I want to really focus on that patient experience. And honestly, that’s why we didn’t call it Some-Complicated-Name Health,” Dua said back in 2021. “That’s why we called it HeyRenee, because it should be just that personable that you feel like your daughter is taking care of you.”

Then there’s Tia, which, no, is not a name, but means “aunt” in Spanish.

“[It] symbolizes the caring and trusting relationship we want women to have with their health — akin to the relationship you might have with your aunt or an important woman in your life you can always turn to without judgment,” a spokesperson for the company said in a statement.

What’s in a name?

But what’s the deal with the emotional appeal? Ralph said branding agencies spend a lot of time talking to founders about authenticity and the reason they started the company.

“If you focus the company around functional benefits, then another company will come along that is cheaper or faster and knock you off your post,” Ralph said. “But if you have this more emotional, sticky connection with consumers, then you can retain that No. 1 top spot.”

Agencies will often brainstorm hundreds of names before putting only a handful in front of a client. There are functional aspects to choosing a name — it has to be easy to brand on a mobile app and web banner. It has to be searchable. It has to, in a way, stand the test of time. And will the company name make sense in an Asian market or a South American market?

After working with a legal firm to screen through hundreds of options, agencies often only have a handful left to present the client.

“It’s actually one of the hardest deliverables,” Ralph said. “Doing a website, doing the brand system, all the other pieces are relatively easy compared to the name.”

But the hardest part is longevity. These companies, ideally, will be around for a long time. So the name they choose has to be unique in the moment as well as remain fresh even decades later.

“At the end of the day it is about differentiation,” Ralph said. “As soon as a human name is not differentiated, then it’s time to consider a different direction.”

If any startup out there wants to hop on the naming trend while staying original, I’ve got a few more friends you can choose from.

Illustration: Dom Guzman

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