For Philip Ripman, a fund manager at Storebrand Asset Management, this is an opportunity for investors in the “chronologically underrepresented” pharmaceutical industry. That area is women’s healthcare, according to Ripman, who manages the $1 billion Storebrand Global Solutions fund. “Within the portfolio, the area we’re really focusing on is women’s healthcare. It’s one of the areas that’s been understudied and underrepresented for a long time,” he told Pro Talks last week. Outside of breast cancer, women’s health conditions attracted just 1% of drug research funding in 2020, according to a McKinsey report last year. Only 2 percent of medtech funding focuses on women’s health conditions unrelated to cancer. Much of the research has been done “from a male perspective,” Lippman said, adding that this is changing. “I think in that sense, a lot of the new business models are interesting,” he said. “What we’d like to see is more focus on the women’s healthcare side of the portfolio.” The femtech space — or software and technology offerings related to women’s health — is certainly growing. In 2021, venture capital investment in femtech surpassed $2 billion for the first time and is expected to reach $3 billion by 2030, according to Pitchbook. Stocks to Consider Among Ripman’s sustainability-focused funds, there are a number of stocks that play on this theme. They include Hologic, a US-based medtech company focused on women’s health, Becton Dickinson, a US-based medtech company, and Gedeon Richter, a Europe-based pharmaceutical company that has women’s healthcare as one of its areas of expertise. According to FactSet, analysts see an average potential upside of 14% for Hologic, though only 35% of analysts have Buy ratings on the stock. Becton Dickinson also gets about 14% potential upside from analysts, with 65% of them rating it a Buy. The Storebrand Global Solutions Fund invests in four themes: Smart Cities, Circular Economy, Equal Opportunity and Renewable Energy. The principle of the fund is to avoid companies that derive more than 5% of their revenue from fossil fuels, tobacco, alcohol, war and other sideline-related activities. Over the long run, the strategy appears to be paying off: It tops Morningstar’s list of global large-cap equity funds for its 10-year annualized return (15%). — CNBC’s Michael Bloom contributed to this report.