Iceland Innovation Week featured fireside chats, and I was fortunate enough to host the Founder’s stage and witness the talk, “Under the Covers: Sextech, Sleep, and Women’s Wellness” with Anna Lee, Co-Founder & CEO of Lioness, and Erla Björnsdóttir, Founder & CEO of SheSleep.
Anna and Erla began their discussion by acknowledging the current state of women’s healthcare—a historically under-researched and underserved area that has only recently gained attention.
Anna and Erla began their discussion with acknowledgement of the standard of women’s health care today – that it is an area which is historically under researched and underserved, and that only recently in the past few years, has this area gained attention.
Anna shared a humorous anecdote about attending an industry event where a person told her to try one of the vibrators on her nose, as it is the industry standard for testing how it will feel for a clitoris;
“All those times in my life when I thought, this toy doesn’t work for me, something’s wrong with me, I think I’m broken, I realized that, it wasn’t me, it was the fact that that is an industry standard that was still used to this day”.
Anna Lee, Co-Founder & CEO of Lioness
Anna elaborated that it wasn’t until 2022 that we learned how many nerve fibers the clitoris has (more than 10,000), up until that point, it was based on a study from 1976 on tissue from a cow’s clitoris. (Read more about this here).
The Lioness Smart Vibrator
Lioness helps women understand their bodies and orgasms. This rabbit-style vibrator measures pelvic floor movements to detect arousal and orgasms. Many women struggle to achieve orgasm, and the Lioness vibrator helps them interpret data about their bodies—what arouses them, what works for them, and even the best time of day for arousal.
Their website features an incredible array of scientific backed information including guides to anatomy, orgasm, health and more.
SheSleep
SheSleep is an app designed to help women track and improve their sleep. It is supported by science and developed by sleep specialists – and you can see some of Erla’s publications on this topic here.
The app is designed specifically for women with a focus on hormonal health and balance. It currently works with Apple Health wearables and will soon be available with Google Health. Find it here: https://www.shesleep.com
Sextech and sleep
The discussion between Anna and Erla was engaging, quickly filling the room as it usually does when sextech is on the agenda. The organizers of Iceland Innovation Week cleverly paired these two together to focus on women’s health, an area where sextech and sleeptech are seldom discussed together, yet are interconnected.
Erla and Anna discussed how women’s sleep patterns differ after orgasm. Many women feel more awake after an orgasm, unlike men who typically feel sleepy. These insights lead to a better understanding of our bodies and needs. Lioness uses anonymized data, with user consent, to conduct research studies, such as their current study on Pleasure and Menopause..
Hormonal health for sleep
Erla highlighted the need to understand how hormones affect sleep, emphasizing,
“It is almost considered normal for women to be sleepless, whether they are pregnant, postpartum, or during menopause, and that’s not normal.”
Erla Björnsdóttir, Founder & CEO of SheSleep
She explained that people accept these sleepless periods, and doctors often reinforce this, and that it’s crucial to learn about our hormones and bodies to improve sleep quality and duration.
An audience member asked for tips for better sleep, and the answer included more exercise, less alcohol, less stress, better routines, and many more suggestions that we have heard before, but which are often hard to implement. The SheSleep app offers an opportunity to practice these good habits.
TechTruster has written about sleep solutions before, these Blue Light Glasses and the Oura Ring.
Overall, it was a fascinating conversation, and I’m grateful to have hosted and heard it as part of Iceland Innovation Week.