Male reproductive health often flies under the radar, but Jack Fertility is determined to change that. Founded in May 2022 in Oxford by Nick Shipley and Lily Elsner, the startup was born out of frustration with the awkwardness and hassle surrounding male fertility testing.
Fuel Ventures led a £500,000-plus pre-seed funding round, joined by angel investors affiliated with Microsoft, Alma Angels, The Beam Network, and existing supporters such as Moonstone Venture Capital and FemTech Lab. The company has also benefited from grants and accelerator programs, including Founders Factory’s Reckitt Benckiser Accelerator and the Oxford Seed Fund.
The pair first crossed paths during their MBA at Oxford in 2019, bonding over the observation that men are often left out of the conversation when it comes to fertility. Nick’s personal struggles navigating fertility assessments during the pandemic, combined with Lily’s medical science and healthtech expertise, sparked the idea for an accessible, stigma-free solution that men can use from their own homes.
Their flagship product, Snip Check™, is the UK’s first fully portable vasectomy test kit. It offers men a discreet, effortless way to confirm if their vasectomy was successful. Behind the scenes, Jack Fertility’s sperm preservation technology keeps samples viable for up to five days while in the mail, striking a rare balance between convenience and clinical accuracy.
While competitors like ExSeed Health and Mojo offer at-home or remote testing options, they often require inconvenient clinic appointments or less rigorous sampling methods. Jack Fertility cuts through these barriers, pairing its innovative mail-in kits with a mobile app that delivers clear results and connects users to supportive communities. For the founders, the ambition is clear: to make sperm testing as routine and accepted as measuring blood pressure.
With fresh capital in hand, Jack Fertility is gearing up to launch Snip Check™ and is rapidly developing a full home-to-lab semen analysis kit. Their long-term goal is to create a suite of data-driven, user-friendly reproductive health tools that empower men worldwide to take control of their fertility on their terms.
