With their loud noises and hard plastic flanges, breast pumps are the bane of many a new mothers existence.
Founded in 2013, Naya Health is one of the most notable tech startups working on a better pump.
But the companys support site is now shutdown and its stopped updating its social media accounts.
In a report today, CNBC spoke to several customers who said their pumps, which cost $1,000 and arent covered by insurance, had stopped working, and Naya Health had not provided them with adequate support or replacement parts.While the Naya Health breast pumps price tag is significantly more than most competing devices, customers were willing to give it a chance because of its unique flange design, which used silicone and water instead of plastic cups to recreate a nursing babys mouth.Users have left a series of complaints on Naya Healths Facebook page since May about performance issues, poor customer service, and long shipping times or non-delivery of pumps they ordered months ago.
A Kickstarter campaign created for Naya Healths smart baby bottle, which raised more than $100,000, is also filled with complaints about orders not being fulfilled (the last response from co-founder and CEO Janica Alvarez was posted six months ago).Naya Healths Facebook and Instagram accounts havent been updated since summer, even though users are still using them to post complaints, while its Twitter account has been set to protected mode.
As CNBC noted, many customers have begun turning to the Better Business Bureaus site to post complaints after saying their messages and calls to Naya Health went unanswered.An email sent to Alvarez, who co-founded the company with her husband Jeffery Alvarez, Naya Healths CTO, received an auto-reply.
TechCrunch has also contacted Naya Health investors Tandem Capital and Bojiang Capital, the co-leads of its seed round, for comment.The company has raised $4.6 million in angel and seed funding, according to Crunchbase.