Breathable, a fledgling virtual therapy provider, went from concept to launch to offering services in 16 states and Washington D.C. in about six months.
While the barrier to entry in digital mental health is extremely low, the company had something of a leg up to help it clear that barrier and apparently take off running. Breathable CEO Joseph Fournier told BHB that his previous work as an attorney, as an executive at large health systems, and as the president of a separate telehealth company for more than three years helped him navigate many startup issues that other companies would get snagged on.
“Not to say that we don’t still have things to learn — we understand the foundations of telehealth and of providing good service, and using tech to help provide it,” Fournier said.
Founded in September 2025, the company focuses on helping adults in midlife through menopause and andropause, supporting couples and treating teens and young adults.
It also helps to capitalize on strategic insights and to get admin support from an established sister company. Fournier is also concurrently the CEO of virtual medical wellness provider E-Volve Company Inc. A representative of the company told BHB after the interview that “Breathable and Evolve are two separate and distinct companies, connected by common ownership and leadership. … Breathable does purchase some personnel and administrative services from Evolve for the time being.”
Shant Atikian, chairman of Breathable, is also a founder of E-Volve Company and Dow Ridge Capital.
On top of support with hormonal changes, several patients of E-Volve Company, which operates as Evolve Telemedicine, asked for mental health services to help people going through fundamental changes to all aspects of their lives as their bodies changed during midlife.
“We know that from caring for many menopausal patients or perimenopausal patients at Evolve … that there’s this quiet, insidious sense of disconnection from themselves and from others and from their personal identity as they go through this,” Fournier said. “We see the opportunity to support women in their whole experience from a mental health standpoint.”
The company has built a corps of 1099 therapists and establishes fair-market rates in each state where it operates. Fournier interviews each therapist and checks their work and interest against the company’s standards, which include therapists having a clear interest in measurable care outcomes. As a conceptual key at the company, Fournier hopes to identify therapists that have high standards for themselves, understand the significance of care continuity and, in turn, understand the need for clients to have good patient and consumer experiences. This doubles as a provider retention strategy in a market where competition for therapists is fierce. In outpatient mental health, developing solid relationships with patients is one of the only roundly validated, predictive indicators of good care outcomes.
Breathable focuses on technologies that enhance therapists’ capacity to see more patients, addressing one of the fundamental problems of all behavioral health — the massive supply-demand imbalance.
“I’ve worked in healthcare for 20 years, and I know that there’s just a dearth of services available: even if we add more therapists every year, the demand continues to just outstrip supply,” Fournier said. “In my mind, companies like Breathable are going to win for patients in the future because we’re able to expand access without just linearly adding clinicians.
“We use things like technology as an enabler so that our clinicians spend time treating their clients — that’s where they shine the most. They’re able to deliver outcomes instead of fragmented sessions with patients where the access is there, maybe, but the outcome isn’t necessarily there over the long term.”
The use of technology is and will be vital to supporting young patients, Fournier said.
“If I learn anything from watching my kids, it’s that we can’t medicalize adolescence. We have to support them on their journey, and they need people who understand them. They need a safe place to be and support that fits into their life, not the other way around,” Fournier said. “After spending so much time in healthcare over the years, I see that healthcare often expects for us to work around it, not for it to work around us.”
Breathable enters the scene at a very interesting time for digital mental health companies. The massive flood of capital into digital healthcare has tapered off: mental health still remains an investor favorite in terms of top funding categories. The prevailing dynamic shows a hollowing out of the middle for funding. Previous data show that larger, more established companies in the space can command huge funding rounds, while the earlier-stage companies are struggling to get the attention of funders, creating a David and Goliath effect.
Near the end of last year, interventional psychiatry startup Radio landed a $50 million Series A round. In February, digital psychiatry practice Talkiatry secured $210 million for its Series C. The big-dollar, late-series rounds — including Grow Therapy’s $150 million Series D —for both provider organizations and pure-play tech companies zeroed in on behavioral health has created something of a revival of investment in the space.