CEO, The Pink Ceiling

Cindy Whitehead

The New York Times called her pharmaceutical product the drug of a generation and Fortune called her a tireless force of nature. Associates of hers call her unapologetically pink. Cindy Whitehead is a highly regarded women’s health advocate and serial entrepreneur.

Over a distinguished 22-year career in healthcare, in only the last 10 she has started and sold two businesses for more than $1.5B. She co-founded and last served as CEO for Sprout Pharmaceuticals where, in 2015, the company broke through with the first ever FDA-approved drug for low sexual desire in women — dubbed “female Viagra” by the media. She started Sprout only one day after selling another that she also co-founded, Slate Pharmaceuticals, which redefined long lasting testosterone treatment for men.

Cindy has made waves, and made her own success, in the field of sexual medicine and creating mission driven companies that deliver big. Her results became a widely covered business success story featured in major media outlets: The New York Times, Associated Press, Financial Times, Vanity Fair, Bloomberg, CNBC, CBS, Fox, Yahoo and the cover feature of Entrepreneur Magazine. Cindy has been an invited speaker at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women, at the Fast Company Innovation Festival, SXSW and Inc. Women about what it takes for breakthrough business success. For all of her accomplishments, she is most proud of the profoundly positive impact that her products have had in people’s lives and her company’s outcomes have had for her teams.

Cindy has a new mission to mentor, invest in, launch and build other women led or focused businesses. In 2016, she opened the doors to The Pink Ceiling — a cross between a VC firm, a ‘pinkubator’ and a consulting enterprise — where she is CEO. In very rare moments she is hard at work trying not to work. You cannot miss Cindy. What she touches turns to Pink.