Being a woman has worked against Ellen Rudolph in two major ways. On one hand, it put her in the majority. Nearly 80 percent of those suffering from an autoimmune disease are women. On the other, it put her in the minority. Female-founded startups only receive 2 percent of the total venture capital funds in the U.S.

But on Tuesday, WellTheory, Rudolph's AI-powered autoimmune care platform, announced it had raised another $14 million, bringing the startup's total capital to $26.2 million.

"As a woman living with an autoimmune disease, I spent many years navigating systems that weren't built for patients like me, and the same is true on the founder front too," Ellen Rudolph, the CEO and founder of WellTheory, told Newsweek ahead of Tuesday's fundraising announcement.

Nodding to how few

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