Pretty sure it does yeah, just as you need serums researched and unlocked to unlock some of those male serums from Ashley and get mastery in them.
I know you need to research certain serum traits for 'upgrades' to your own serums. I was more wondering if
one certain serum is being used to start off the quest-chain involving Ashley, her story AND the male-serums. Which Serum(-trait)? was holding up my game?
I found myself already playing with Tier 3 serums, while Ashley was doing nothing (I did skip some Tier 1 serum research) It was only after clearing some, shall we say, 'backlog traits' (like caffeine infusion and a few others). Then suddenly Ashley had daily upgrades happening, like she was catching up. And suddenly she was also coming into the CEO office for boob-stuff and walking me home (don't know if that is related?)
I think it might be smarter to have this Event Chain not trigger on something that could be overlooked in this way?