ENTERING THE AT-HOME WORKOUT VERTICAL, CULT.FIT ACQUIRES TREAD

A fitness and well-being platform, Cure.fit founded in 2016 by Mukesh Bansal and Ankit Nagori has come a long way since its inception. This Bangalore-based startup has successfully ventured into eat.fit, mind.fit, cult.fit, sugar.fit, care.fit, cultsport, and live, through which it offers digital and offline services in fitness, nutrition and mental well-being. Foraying into the fitness hardware segment, Cult.fit (rebranded across all platforms on 11th May 2021) has acquired Bangalore-based fitness start-up, TREAD on 10th June, 2021, which recently came out with their first smart fitness bike.

With the pandemic shutting shop for the offline cult.fit centres, partnered gyms, or fitness centers, Cult.fit launched its digital fitness segment last year, through its ‘Live’ feature which allows users to stream live workouts at the comfort of their homes, while also tracking the energy expended using their ‘Energy meter’ feature. Launching itself into the hardware-at-home business vertical, Cult intends to launch a suite of smart fitness hardware products such as TREAD Smart bikes and benches.

“There is immense scope in the burgeoning fitness hardware market and as a leader in the fitness space; we aim to make the best technology and products available to our customers. The acquisition of TREAD is a leap in that direction. With their team, we plan to offer a unique suite of products that will help us foray into the at-home fitness hardware market and further differentiate the cult.fit platform from any other in the fitness industry,” said Mukesh Bansal, founder, cult.fit. 

TREAD, founded in 2020 by Dinesh Godara, is a smart indoor fitness bike, with social features such as live workouts, leaderboards to compete with friends, etc., where users can compete with each other and participate in virtual tournaments, or view any locations of their choice, and it costs Rs. 59,900. It is compact, adjustable and the future of home fitness. As a part of the acquisition deal, TREAD shall operate independently, while its hardware combined with cult.fit’s digital content and technology, will create a unique experience for its consumers. These bikes will be sold online or in the cult stores in the next two-three months.

“With cult.fit, we will be able to significantly accelerate product development and reach more customers. We are launching a suite of connected fitness cardio and strength products. The TREAD One, a smart indoor exercise bike, is our first product which will be followed by digital weight and resistance products, and smart home gym kits. We have already received a lot of interest and several hundred customers have placed pre-orders,” said Dinesh Godara, founder, TREAD.

Having acquired Fitternity, the largest fitness facilities aggregator in the country and California-based Onyx, a fitness company that builds the world’s smartest digital training experience earlier this year, with this latest acquisition, Cult.fit is ready to enter the market with all its guns blazing and become a category leader – the only go-to name in the fitness industry. With a total raise of $479.6 million over a series of 10 funding rounds, the fitness company has a list of marquee investors including Tata Digital, Temasek Holdings, Accel Partners, Kalaari Capital and Chiratae Ventures to name a few. 

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