Mi Tribu Founders on Prenatal & Postpartum Care in LatAm

The duo Magdalena Ramírez and Sebastián Espinoza are the minds behind Mi Tribu, an innovative digital platform designed to guide Spanish-speaking mothers and families through the first 1,000 days of their babies’ lives. Their digital group care solution is currently live in Latin America, where access to evidence based and modern prenatal and postpartum support can be scarce and expensive. Their goal is to scale it globally.

A native Chilean with prior work experience in the private and public sectors, Ramírez came to the maternal healthcare space organically. Living in the U.S, she became a mom for the first time and struggled with her mental health, which is a common complication across pregnancy and postpartum worldwide. As entrepreneurs and parents themselves, she and Espinoza — who also hails from Chile and holds an MBA and a master’s degree in public policy from Stanford University — wanted to create a product that could educate and empower expectant parents at this critical juncture in their lives.

As co-founders of Mi Tribu, Ramírez and Espinoza are 2023-24 fellows of the Alpine Social Ventures (ASV) program. Established in 2022, ASV aims to support the next generation of social-impact leaders by providing capital, insights and connections to help get their businesses off the ground. Below, the duo reflect on launching Mi Tribu, supporting expectant mothers and partners and using Alpine Investors’ playbook to strategize for the company’s future.

Walk us through Mi Tribu’s origins. What inspired you?

Ramírez: Like every new mom, when I found out I was pregnant, I became full of questions —am I doing this right? Am I going to be a good mom? I struggled with anxiety, so I reached out to my therapist. I wasn’t alone in my mental health struggles — women are nearly twice as likely as men to be diagnosed with depression, for example, and are particularly vulnerable during motherhood. In the U.S, 1 in 5 women were not asked about depression during prenatal care, and 1 in 2 pregnant women with depression were not treated. In Chile, where I am from, up to 1 in 3 pregnant women suffer symptoms of anxiety or depression, a figure that increases to 1 in 2 women postpartum. It’s an important challenge to address since a mother’s well-being directly impacts her child’s development.

Espinoza: I was studying at Stanford and searching for a space where I could contribute when I became a parent of two. At the same time, I encountered the famous Heckman Curve by the economics Nobel prize winner James Heckman, showing how crucial it is to invest in families as early as possible. Growing my own family among an international community of student families at Stanford made me realize how countries approach parenthood differently, and being immersed in Silicon Valley made it clear that technology could have a huge potential to improve the way people are born.

The Heckman Curve describes that the earlier the investment, the greater the return.

Ramírez: With all this in mind, Sebastián and I committed to act in this field. There are so many great examples of new teams and solutions improving the prenatal and postpartum journey in Europe and the United States. But when we looked at the Spanish-speaking population in the U.S and Latin America, there’s still so much to be done. We embarked to find a solution that is more accessible for lower-income populations but has high-quality resources.

How exactly does Mi Tribu operate? What kinds of resources and information do users receive?

Ramírez: In most cases, during the first months of pregnancy, women have in-person appointments every four weeks. This typically looks like a 20-minute appointment where your gynecologist or midwife takes your blood pressure, weighs you and maybe has time to talk through a couple of questions about your body.

But as mothers-to-be, we have questions every day and our questions go beyond our body. Amid the non-evidence-based information sourced from social media influencers, it can be hard to find clinically validated information on your own that you can rely on. It’s also hard to find a community of women in the same stage of pregnancy as you and with similar interests.

When a mom-to-be registers for Mi Tribu’s subscription-based service, she is contacted by our care coordinator, who welcomes her and matches her with one of our midwives, who will be her guide throughout her pregnancy. The two have an introductory meeting, and based on the mom’s interest, the midwife invites her to join one of the chat-based groups (or “tribes”) that she guides. The group experience has been critical to building a sense of belonging where women feel safe and supported by their peers and the health professionals.

Each group is also guided by a psychologist and pelvic floor specialists who, through digital group events, cover topics beyond what’s shared during in-person appointments. Group care is complicated to implement, but with technology, we can provide weekly clinically validated, personalized information and tools to women and their partners while also digesting the important information for the in-person gynecologist or midwife up to delivery. After birth, the midwife guide is replaced by a pediatric nurse. We are working to support the first 1,000 days of babies, from conception up to the second birthday.

When you subscribe to Mi Tribu, you get access to top professionals, technology to help you navigate the journey and a community that understands you.

What steps have you taken to mitigate cost-related barriers for new parents?

Espinoza: We’re implementing the group care model in a digital format with the goal of generating better health and education outcomes, satisfaction and accessibility. Accessing health professionals can be expensive depending on one’s healthcare coverage. But with a group model, you can distribute the cost, making it economically more viable. Group care can be as effective and even have more benefits than individual care. Our vision is to bring this scalable intervention to every family. Ideally, it’s a model that can make a cultural change and become the new standard of care.

When did you first become aware of the ASV program, and how has it supported your company’s growth?

Espinoza: I was studying at Stanford at the time and found that ASV was filling a big gap —there were so many opportunities to get support to start a business, but very few were intertwined with social impact. Magdalena and I connected with prior ASV fellows, and their experiences were inspiring because they were following different paths. Some were VC-backed, others bootstrapped– but they all had big aspirations.

One of Alpine’s aspirations is to be a Force For Good and have a positive global impact. That was a great synergy for us because we’re trying to learn from different sources and have a global reach. We have leveraged the market strategies from Alpine’s playbook. We’ve been meeting regularly with Alpine’s team too, and that has been great.

The ASV program is filling a gap for social-impact ventures where it’s needed the most, which is in going from the ideation phase into implementing first steps. For us, that support was critical.

What is your vision for the future of Mi Tribu?

Ramírez: We aspire to eliminate mental health taboos around motherhood and fatherhood. We’ll continue our work on the importance of mental health, particularly from a preventative angle.

For example, during our program, we talk about mental health and give tools to identify signs before it becomes a problem. It’s an aspect we want to continue solving: How do we empower families to have more control of their own experience during motherhood, during pregnancy and postpartum? We believe that forward-looking professionals, technology and a caring community can help us improve the care journey of families.

Espinoza: This first year, we have mainly been focused on the end users and the product. The strategy we follow is to build close relationships with the end user first, contrary to common solutions in the healthcare industry that are built around B2B partnerships. We have been working to build the experience for Mi Tribu families that directly pay us first.

But now that we’re almost in our second year of operating, we’re building up B2B partnerships to scale that second aspect. We’re working with multinational companies, health insurances, governments and educational non-profits that will not only allow us to better access the first market that we’re working with, which is Chile, but also to go abroad. Our vision is to be able to impact 1 million families in the upcoming five years.

Read more about Alpine’s Force For Good initiatives here and the ASV program here.

Certain statements about Alpine made by ASV fellows herein are intended to illustrate Alpine’s business relationship with such persons, including with respect to Alpine’s facilities as a business partner, rather than Alpine’s capabilities or expertise with respect to investment advisory services. ASV fellows were not compensated in connection with their participation, although they generally receive compensation and investment opportunities in connection with their ASV company roles, and in certain cases are also owners of portfolio company securities and/or investors in Alpine-sponsored vehicles. Such compensation and investments subject participants to potential conflicts of interest in making the statements herein. Past performance not indicative of future results. Results may vary materially and adversely. Please see Alpine’s Terms of Use for additional disclaimers.