Indian quantified-self app raises $15m in Series A round
Healthcare and fitness start-up CureFit has raised $15m in one of the largest Series A funds for an Indian company. Created by former Flipkart executives Mukesh Bansal and Ankit Nagori, the CureFit app offers an "end-to-end solution that will enable users to take full control of their health". There are plans to join forces with other offline health and fitness providers. Kalaari Capital, Accel Partners and IDG Ventures are the backers investing in the app, which is set to launch early next year.

Bengaluru: CureFit, a healthcare and fitness start-up launched by former Flipkart executives Mukesh Bansal and Ankit Nagori, has raised as much $15 million in Series A funds from Kalaari Capital, Accel Partners and IDG Ventures, one of the largest early rounds of funding ever by an Indian start-up.

CureFit will launch an app in the first half of next year that will offer preventive healthcare services.

It also plans to tie up with offline health and fitness service providers such as gymnasiums.

The company has hired 10 employees to work on product, technology and other functions. Kalaari’s founder Vani Kola will join CureFit’s board of directors.

“We aim to build out an innovative product which will help the consumers manage their health proactively with heavy use of technology and data. We will offer solutions to all people who want to live healthily and avoid lifestyle diseases. So, we will first focus on preventive healthcare and then expand to other areas. We’re looking at this market as a 8-10 year play," Bansal said.

All the three investors, Kalaari, Accel and IDG, had also backed Bansal in his previous venture Myntra, the online fashion retailer that was bought by Flipkart in May 2014 in a $330 million-plus deal.

“We believe that proactive health management is a large space and requires the right mix of online and offline channels," said Subrata Mitra, partner, Accel Partners. “Both experiences, seamlessly integrated will provide end-to-end proactive health management to consumers. It’s a complex problem and, therefore, needs the right entrepreneur to address. This is where the combined strength of Mukesh and Ankit will be invaluable. Mukesh is an outstanding entrepreneur and CEO. Adding Ankit provided the right balance of strategy and execution to the team."

Bansal and Nagori resigned as commerce platform head and chief business officer, respectively, from Flipkart in February. Their departures followed a restructuring at Flipkart in January in which the firm named Binny Bansal as its new chief executive, replacing Sachin Bansal.

In March, Bansal and Nagori said they pooled in $5 million to launch a start-up in the area of healthcare and sports and fitness.

Existing healthcare start-ups such as Practo and 1mg are also adding sport and fitness categories to boost user engagement.

Given the massive size of the healthcare sector, many start-ups and investors are aggressively looking for opportunities to build businesses in this space.

“Currently, there are multiple service offerings available in the market in a fragmented manner, but none of them lets users manage their health needs end to end. CureFit is an end-to-end solution that will enable users to take full control of their health to improve the quality of life and reduce long-term healthcare costs," said Nagori.