Andrea Barrica - Sextech Revolution: The Future of Sexual Wellness

When I pitch investors, I place a 3 D - printed model of this on the table and ask:

Do you know what this is?

Can you recognize the structure? Ill give you some hints: Its an organ in the human body. Its inside roughly half of the population. It is densely distributed with nerve endings, and its only job is to experience pleasure. In fact, its the most powerful pleasure organ in the human body.

It is the clitoris.

Did you recognize it? Dont worry. Most people dont.

None of the venture capital investors Ive shown it to have had any idea what it is. Neither have many of the medical doctors Ive met. (Perhaps thats because most medical students receive fewer than ten hours of sex education during their entire four years in medical school.)

Until relatively recently, the clitoris and other major aspects of human sexuality were largely ignored by the scientific community. The 1948 edition of Greys Anatomy went so far as to omit the clitoris completely, but even today information on pleasure, especially female pleasure, is barely touched on in medical textbooks. For years, the clitoris was regarded as having no reproductive role whatsoever, and in the nineteenth century, doctors even recommended removing it to prevent hysteria.

When the clitoris is discussed today, its talked about as a 1-2cm external tip, rather than the fully formed, comprehensive 10cm organ pictured above. Its thanks to researchers like Dr. Helen OConnell, who produced one of the first fully realized anatomical depictions of the clitoris in 1998, that we have a sense of its true scope and importance.

As HuffPos Cliteracy project so aptly observed, we put a man on the moon in 1969, invented the internet in 1982, and didnt fully understand the anatomy of the clitoris until 1998.

Thats some seriously powerful stigma.

People dont like to talk about the concept of a powerful organ that solely exists to experience pleasure. The concept of pleasure itself is difficult for people to talk aboutparticularly with family, partners, or medical professionals.

Most of us are taught that sex is shameful, that pleasure is indulgent, and that using your body for one of its naturally designed purposes is somehow abuse. As a result, parents dont talk with children. Lovers dont communicate with partners. And medical providers often ignore the subject altogether.

Why is sex not a basic, normal part of wellnessand why has over half of the population been ignored?

As an entrepreneur and the owner of a clitoris, this baffling question pushed me into the industry known as sextechtechnologies, products, and services that seek to innovate and improve the human sexual experience.

There are 7.7 billion people on earth, and with the exception of babies born through in vitro fertilization and other procedures, each exists because two people had sex. We talk about sex all the timein magazines, blogs, television series, jokes, sermons, movies, ads, fashion, podcasts, and porn. Were obsessed with sex, but who are the major brands that shape our daily experiences with sexuality? Where are the reputable, trusted voices?

As I researched this question, I found that for all our fascination with the subject, there are very few that provide an answerand the ones that do tend to sensationalize it, rather than strip it down. Sexual wellness is like a huge meadowa vibrant ecosystem carpeted in small plants and grasses, but no major trees.

Two years after launching O.school, and countless venture capital meetings, speaking panels, product development meetings, interviews and conversations with activists, entrepreneurs, doctors, and nonprofits in the space, Im still learning. But Ive realized that just as sex has no central place for information, neither does sextech. So many of us are working independently, siloed in our own corner, with few networking events or shared resources.

Im writing this book for people who have the desire to push forward sexual wellness. I want to share what Ive learned in my conversations with investors, founders, activists, policy makers, and educators.

Why is a market so large so behind in innovation, tools, resources, and solutions? Why are there so few places to talk about sex honestly and accuratelyoffline or online? What are the hurdles that have stopped the previous generation, and how can we begin to get around them? How can so many people have so many progressive ideas about sex and sexualityand still fall short of creating mass change in our culture? How can the need be so great, and yet the market be so unfulfilled?

In short, whats the future of sexual wellness?

In this book, Ill talk about the growing sexual wellness industry, the problems, and challenges in the market for both customers and entrepreneurs. Ill lay out both the progress were making and the roadblocks we face. Ill tell you about the trends that augur well for us, and where the market might take us. Ill lay out my vision of what the future of sexual wellness looks like, and some of the challenges we will need to overcome to get there.

I think I echo the sentiments of many of the leaders in the sexual wellness space who want it to be much bigger. Those of us in this space seem to understand that if, together, we can begin dismantling stigma and improving access, we all stand to benefitas entrepreneurs and as a world community.

I am but one of a number of innovators in sexual wellness, from reproductive rights and pleasure activists, sex educators, feminist writers, sexologists and researchers, nonprofit innovators, sextech founders, and countless beacons of sex positivity serving their friends and communities with peer - led support and education. Its on their shoulders that I stand.

There are other books about the recent developments in sexual wellness worth calling out specifically, like Emily Nagoskis groundbreaking book, Come as You Are , one of the best modern books about the science of sexuality and desire. Esther Perels book State of Affairs has shifted the way we think about infidelity, intimacy, and desire in modern relationships. Sonya Renee Taylors The Body Is Not an Apology is a gem in the body positivity movement. Lynn Comellas Vibrator Nation covers the history of sex toy education and feminist sex stores. Adrienne Maree Browns Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good is an important read in the intersection of pleasure and activism.

Anyone working in this space needs to understand that sextech is like the clitoris itselfthe visible part, the part getting all the attention, is actually just a small part of a much larger structure. To succeed, entrepreneurs and advocates in this space need to understand the contours of human sexuality, to understand the politics of inclusion and the history of this movement. While I can share my experiences and what Ive learned, Im at best a cluster of nerve endings.

In fact, one of the things we will cover is the evolving use of language around gender and health. Just as Ive learned to code - switch my use of language between speaking with my parents in our Filipino home and speaking to people differently elsewhere, and using venture capital lingo and translating these terms to other communities, Ive chosen to code switch sometimes between mainstream binary terms for gender and the new, inclusive language used in sexual wellness spaces. This means sometimes referring to industries like femtech and speaking in terms of men and women. I will also sometimes use the new language of inclusive sexual wellness, which you may see when we talk about people with vulvas and reproductive health. In chapter 5, we will dive deeper into why this is important.