Spring Fertility, the venture-backed IVF chain founded in San Francisco in 2016, is facing several lawsuits: at least three from patients alleging lost or mixed-up embryos at its Bay Area clinics, a proposed class action accusing it of sharing sensitive patient data with Meta and LinkedIn, and an employment case filed by a former worker. Plaintiffs in the patient cases tie the clinic’s alleged failures to pressure from its investor, Wildcat Capital Management, to grow quickly and cut costs.
The Embryo Loss and Mix-Up Cases
Amy Shu Chang sued in March 2025 over an incident at the San Francisco clinic on May 22, 2024. According to her complaint, she arrived for her second embryo transfer, was handled by staff she described as the “B Team,” and was told after the procedure that her two embryos had been lost. She alleged that Dr. Nam Tran, the clinic’s co-founder and chief medical officer, struggled with a catheter insertion and left her on the exam table for more than 15 minutes without a medical explanation.1San Francisco Standard. Spring Fertility Clinic IVF Lawsuits Chang says she turned down a settlement offer from Spring Fertility that would have provided a free egg retrieval and IVF cycle in exchange for waiving her right to sue.2Yahoo News. Bay Area Couple Sues Clinic
A second couple, identified in court papers by the pseudonyms J.W. and M.W., sued over a July 16, 2024, appointment at which staff told them two embryos from a recent retrieval had been discarded because of a “contaminated container.” Their complaint alleges Dr. Tran ignored their requests for information for more than a month afterward.1San Francisco Standard. Spring Fertility Clinic IVF Lawsuits
A third case, filed in July 2023 by a same-sex couple, alleges an embryo mix-up about a year earlier. One partner became pregnant and then miscarried. The couple later learned the clinic had implanted the other partner’s last remaining embryo rather than the patient’s own, contrary to their instructions. One woman lost her final embryo; the other carried it without her consent.1San Francisco Standard. Spring Fertility Clinic IVF Lawsuits
The Investor-Pressure Theory
The patient complaints share a common theory: that operational failures at Spring Fertility trace back to its investor, Wildcat Capital Management, a single-family office founded in 2011 for billionaire David Bonderman that has held a stake in the clinic since 2019.3Wildcat Capital Management. Wildcat Capital Management
Chang’s complaint alleges that Spring Fertility “failed to sufficiently staff its facilities, failed to adequately train and supervise its personnel, and accepted far too many customers than they could reasonably and safely accommodate,” calling those failures an effort to “cut corners and increase profits at the direction of its venture capital investors.” Former patients quoted in press coverage described the clinic as an “egg-freezing factory.”1San Francisco Standard. Spring Fertility Clinic IVF Lawsuits
Spring Fertility disputes the ownership premise. A company representative told the San Francisco Standard that Spring is “controlled and majority owned by its physician partners — not Wildcat.” Megan Dwyer, the clinic’s VP of marketing, called the lawsuit allegations “inaccurate” and said they “misrepresent the facts,” adding that the company could not discuss specific cases because of patient privacy.1San Francisco Standard. Spring Fertility Clinic IVF Lawsuits
The Meta and LinkedIn Data Class Action
On October 22, 2024, a plaintiff identified as J.S. filed a proposed class action in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, captioned J.S. v. Spring Fertility Holdings LLC, No. 5:24-cv-07374. The complaint alleges that Spring Fertility embedded the Facebook Tracking Pixel and the LinkedIn Insight Tag on its website, and that those trackers intercepted visitors’ personally identifiable information and protected health information, including the type of fertility treatment they were seeking and their sexual orientation. Every time a user accessed springfertility.com, according to the filing, the tracking code caused the browser to send a duplicate copy of the user’s communications to Meta and LinkedIn servers, which then used the data to build targeted advertising audiences.4ISMG. J.S. v. Spring Fertility Holdings Complaint
The suit brings claims under the federal Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the California Invasion of Privacy Act, and the California Confidentiality of Medical Information Act. The plaintiff seeks statutory damages of $5,000 per violation under state wiretapping law, with combined class claims alleged to exceed $5 million.5CompliancePoint. Spring Fertility Case Complaint
On May 27, 2026, Judge Edward J. Davila ruled that the lead plaintiff had sufficiently alleged she did not consent to the disclosure, letting two claims proceed past the pleading stage: invasion of privacy under the California Constitution, and violations of the California Confidentiality of Medical Information Act. The case had not reached class certification or settlement as of that ruling.6Bloomberg Law. Spring Fertility Stuck With Suit Over Data Disclosure to Meta
Employment Case and Worker Complaints
Spring Fertility also faces a former-employee lawsuit, De Alba v. Spring Fertility Management LLC, No. 23CV048946, filed on October 24, 2023, in the Superior Court of California, County of Alameda. The filing names multiple Spring Fertility entities as defendants, including its holdings, management, Oakland, Silicon Valley, and master MSO subsidiaries.7Plainsite. De Alba v. Spring Fertility Management LLC
Outside court, former employees have posted Glassdoor reviews citing low pay, chronic understaffing, poor management, and expectations to do the work of multiple people. Dr. Paula Berg, a former anesthesiologist, posted a Google review roughly a year before April 2025 alleging that her daughter was sent to the ICU after what she called a “botched egg retrieval” at Spring Fertility’s Oakland location. Berg called it “poor quality medical care” and rejected the clinic’s characterization of the incident as a “communication problem.” The San Francisco Standard reported it was unable to reach Berg for comment.1San Francisco Standard. Spring Fertility Clinic IVF Lawsuits
Why These Cases Are Hard to Win
Fertility clinic lawsuits face obstacles other medical claims do not. Dov Fox, a professor at the UC San Diego Center for Health Law Policy and Bioethics, told the San Francisco Standard that IVF-related losses often do not meet the traditional threshold for medical malpractice because they do not always cause physical harm to the patient. Clinics also do not guarantee results, which makes breach-of-contract claims difficult to sustain. Patients who lose embryos typically end up suing under theories of negligence or property damage, which can cap what they recover.1San Francisco Standard. Spring Fertility Clinic IVF Lawsuits
Regulatory oversight is limited as well. Fertility clinic laboratories are not federally inspected the way blood banks are; they rely on private accreditation organizations. California’s hospital rules requiring the reporting of medical errors do not apply to fertility clinics, leaving patients with little recourse outside the courts.