Fertile Opportunity

Fertility issues affect about 10 percent of Americans of reproductive age, according to the National Institutes of Health. Fertility treatments start at about $20,000, which may not be fully covered by health insurance.

Alex Shire, MBA ’04, is CEO of CapexMD, a digital finance company in Scottsdale, Arizona, that focuses exclusively on the fertility market, providing loans of up to $50,000 to support fertility treatment at rates roughly half those of credit cards.

“Our goal is to increase access to care through affordability,” says Shire.

The loans are used to cover a wide variety of treatments and services, including in vitro fertilization, surrogacy, egg and sperm donations, and the freezing and storage of eggs and sperm for future use. They also cover all laboratory and pharmacy costs.

CapexMD keeps costs down in part through relationships with a large number of fertility clinics, labs, banks, and pharmacies around the country. “There are about 500 clinics in the US, and a large majority of them are in our network,” he says.

A single cycle of IVF costs about $20,000, and most of CapexMD’s clients need two or more cycles. But many health insurance plans limit coverage to one cycle. For these patients, CapexMD provides low-cost financing to reduce the financial burden of care.

A major growth area for the company, said Shire, is same-sex couples in need of surrogacy or sperm or egg donations. “It’s a big part of our business, and it’s awesome,” he said.

Shire joined CapexMD in early 2024. Prior to that, he spent two decades as an asset manager for companies such as Capital One, Citadel Investment Group, and Highbridge, where he focused on healthcare investments.

One thing Shire learned in his work in fertility finance is that demand for fertility treatments tends to remain stable even during economic downturns.

“When you combine the resilient demand with the fact that more and more people are having children later in life, it made me realize what a great business fertility is,” he said.

Shire describes his Booth experience as “idyllic” and says it transformed his understanding of how business decisions are made. “Before Booth, I—like most people—had the bad habit of making quick judgments based on limited information,” he said. “Now, I always want to see the data.”