Investor of the Month: Malin Frithiofsson
What if women’s health has never been a niche - but a blind spot?
This month, we spotlight Malin Frithiofsson, founder and CEO of Daya Ventures, whose perspective challenges not only how we talk about women’s health, but also how we invest in it.
She works at the intersection of startups, capital, and healthcare - not as separate domains, but as connected levers shaping how women’s health solutions are built and brought to market.
“I’m from the women’s side.”
Because she did not come into venture capital through a traditional interest in startups or finance, Malin’s starting point has always been different. With a background in gender studies, she has spent years understanding how systems are built, how bias is embedded in them, and how they often overlook women.
“Entrepreneurship is political change for the impatient.”
This means that Malin brings a clear, purpose-driven focus to her investments, using capital and company building to create real change for women.
Not a niche - A misclassification
Malin does not see women’s health as a separate category. In fact, she believes that is exactly where the problem begins.
“We have been categorizing this incorrectly.”
For years, women’s health has been reduced to reproductive health - pregnancy, fertility, menopause. Important areas, but only a fraction of the full picture. As Malin points out, only around five percent of the conditions affecting women are exclusive to women. The remaining 95 percent already exist within the healthcare system - they simply affect women differently or disproportionately.
That shift in perspective changes everything.
“Women’s health is not a market within healthcare. It is a re-optimization of the entire healthcare system.”
Instead of treating women’s health as a separate category, she sees it as something that runs across all of healthcare - from cardiology to neurology to chronic disease. Seen through that lens, women’s health has never been a niche issue - it has been misclassified.
“The market definitely exists. It has just not been fully recognized.”
Investing before it looks investable
If her view on the market challenges convention, her investment approach follows the same logic.
Malin invests earlier than most - often long before a company looks investable on paper. Long before there is traction, metrics or anything that resembles certainty.
“Nothing can be too early,” she says, pointing to investments she has made in the past where there wasn’t even a company founded yet or a pitch deck in place. Just an amazing idea and a bold, passionate founder.
Because what she looks for when investing is something far more difficult to measure: the founder.
“You can tell in a first meeting if someone is the right kind of crazy to make a startup work.”
In her experience, it is not about recklessness, but about obsession - a deep, almost irrational commitment to solving a problem, combined with a strong understanding of the people affected by it. Because that is where she places her bet.
“There is nothing less risky than betting on someone who will not give up.”
Where the system breaks
Despite growing momentum in women’s health, Malin sees a fundamental mismatch between innovation and capital.
And it is not where most people think.
“We have a situation where capital waits for signal - and signal requires capital.”
In women’s health, startups often need to generate data before they can prove traction, because women’s health remains under-researched. And when that data has to be built from scratch, it quickly becomes both expensive and time-consuming.
Which creates a loop:
No data → no funding
No funding → no data
From the outside, it can look like a lack of progress. In reality, the progress just looks different.
“Investors expect the same validation timelines as in traditional digital health. But here, the signal is delayed - not missing.”
This misunderstanding has real consequences. It slows down follow-on funding and undervalues companies that are building foundational infrastructure.
What founders get wrong
One of the most common mistakes Malin sees in early-stage companies is not about the product itself, but about how it is presented to investors.
“They are trying to sell the product to investors. But investors are not there to buy the product.”
Instead, they are buying something else entirely: a share of the company and its future potential.
A strong pitch is not just about explaining what you built. It is about showing:
How the company will grow
How it will reach customers
And why it will become valuable over time
“The product matters. But in early-stage investing, it is not the biggest part.”
Instead, she looks for strong founders who understand their market and know how to reach it.
Start charging. Start learning.
When asked what founders should do earlier, Malin does not hesitate: start charging early.
“The earlier you charge, the stronger the signal.”
Too many startups, especially in the Nordics, spend months or years building before testing whether customers are actually willing to pay. In her view, that is a fundamental mistake.
“In the Nordics, we often skip the MVP stage. What we call an MVP is a full product anywhere else.”
Instead, she encourages founders to start far simpler - and far earlier.
Rather than building the full product, they can begin by delivering the value themselves. Drawing on examples from her own investment experience, she points to founders who did exactly that. One team set out to build AI-driven matching, but instead of building the technology upfront, they started by matching users manually to prove there was demand. Another planned to build an app offering guidance, but began with a paid newsletter, using it to test whether people were actually willing to pay for that support.
So, in short: it is about proving that someone is willing to pay.
“If you are raising to build something and then test if people will pay for it, that is a red flag.”
Staying close to the customer
Beyond early monetization, Malin highlights another recurring issue: distance from the user.
“In the US, startups track multiple user metrics every week. In the Nordics, we often focus on everything else.”
Product development, events and promotion tend to take center stage, while direct interaction with customers becomes secondary. Over time, that creates a gap between what is built and what is actually needed.
She leaves you with one simple question: “How many times have you spoken to a customer this week?”
Not months ago in a user test - but this week.
That, she argues, is where you build both a better product and a strong connection to your users.
More than capital
For Malin, investing is about building companies - not just funding them.
“If you are an early-stage investor, as I am, you have to be part of the team.”
Her role often includes helping founders structure their first funding rounds, connect with the right investors and prepare for institutional funding.
“Define your value as an angel - it needs to be more than capital.”
Returns with a purpose
While Malin is deeply purpose-driven, she is equally clear about the importance of returns. For her, profit and purpose are not in opposition. They are what make it possible to keep investing.
“A strong exit means I can invest in more companies that should exist.”
Returns create the ability to reinvest, scale impact and back the companies that still do not exist - but should.
