Yanghee Paik: Rael Co-Founder and CEO

Rael is a line of clean, high-performance feminine hygiene products, skincare, and supplements designed to help people with periods through every phase of their cycle. Back in 2017, Yanghee Paik and her fellow co-founders were shocked by the outdated offerings in the United States and set out to bring the advanced fem-tech innovations they grew up with in Korea to the U.S. market. They then launched Rael with organic cotton pads, which quickly became the best-selling pads on Amazon. Since then, Rael has raised $35 million in Series B fundraising, launched in major retailers such as Target and Walmart, and just this month, debuted a line of supplements. But Paik wasn’t always running a major startup company—she spent most of her early career working in entertainment, with hopes of popularizing Korean media in America. She steadily rose through the ranks to become an executive at Disney, where she focused on distribution strategy and sales. Though Paik’s career has evolved, her passion for bringing Korean culture to the United States—whether through entertainment media or holistic menstrual cycle care—continues to be her North Star.