According to a recent report, as part of its overseas geographic expansion into South-East Asia, an Indian health and fitness app has forayed into Malaysia to offer its services including diet and fitness plans, said a top official.
The co-founder and Chief Executive of the app noted that the company will expand across Southeast Asia to Singapore, Indonesia and enter the Gulf region over the next quarters. He told this to told reporters at the city-based start-ups’ annual event “Ignite”.
The company has raised RM25 million (Rs 43 crore) from existing investors and InnoVen Capital to fund its new initiatives as an extension to its RM50 million (Rs 86 crore) Series-B funding in February.
The Bengaluru-based start-up has launched its services in Malaysia and has also hired a team of nutritionists and fitness coaches to develop personalised diet and fitness plans for its South-East Asian users.
The platform lets users track their calorie intake by maintaining a digital log and also offers fitness and nutrition coaching from professionals. It also has Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered virtual nutritionist “Ria” offering dietary and fitness suggestions to stay healthy.
Earlier this year, the startup launched its health consultation services to the Indian diaspora living across the world, with a specific focus on the Middle East, Africa and North American geographies.
The app’s co-founder stated that the company has seen itself as a global product company and have built our app in line with global standards.
About 10% of the start-up’s 8 million user base, 10% of fitness coaches and 20% of revenues are from international geographies.
The co-founder noted that the company’s foray into Southeast Asia is an effort to offer a local and curated experience to users there, providing the same level in terms of quality of coaches and technology support its users in India enjoy. The app will enter more markets soon.
The company also announced the expansion of its platform with the launch of its curated online foods marketplace, EatBetter.
According to another report, the curated online foods marketplace specializes in 100% healthy, wholesome food products. With this, the 6-year-old startup marks the expansion of its platform beyond nutrition and training services. The marketplace offers a wide product catalogue curated by the fitness app’s team of elite nutritionists and is intended to handhold users through their weight loss and fitness journeys.
The product line-up includes health bars, breakfast cereals, cookies, roasted snacks, beverages, natural protein supplements, super seeds, dry fruits and trail mixes, priced between RM3.99 (Rs. 70) and RM28.5 (Rs. 500). The marketplace now has 500+ SKUs and the company plans to expand this to over 1000 in the next 12 months.
The report covered the use of AI in this fitness app as well, noting that the app also unveiled a new avatar, aforementioned ‘Ria’. Who an artificial intelligence (AI) powered virtual nutritionist.
Ria 2.0 can now not only listen and read, but also see and identify healthy and unhealthy foods from menu cards, phone screens and entire plates of food.
Powered by Ria, the company also announced the launch of smart diet plans that would be “the world’s first completely automated and curated diet plans” — claims the startup. It would represent the first instance of technology completely managing a human being’s health & fitness needs by designing personalized diet & fitness plans.
The AI’s intelligence stems from the 200 million diet logs made by the app’s users over the years. She can now be accessed through Alexa devices and can understand over 5 languages. The AI is the first port of call for over 35% customers today, even when they have a choice to speak to a human coach.
