Found, a weight-management firm has come out of stealth today with $32 million in total funding and the announcement that Sarah Jones Simmer, the former COO of Bumble, has been named its new CEO. In the spring of 2020, Found was incubated at Atomic, a San Francisco-based startup studio. It raised $24 million in a Series An investment headed by GV (formerly Google Ventures) and Atomic, with Define Ventures as a participant, earlier this year. It also raised $8 million in previously undisclosed seed capital during the last year, primarily from Atomic as well as Define Ventures.
Found was founded to address the “difficult” issue of weight care while embracing telemedicine, according to Jack Abraham, co-founder and managing partner of Atomic. (Abraham is also a co-founder of his and hers, wellness and care telehealth service.)
“With over 70% of the population being overweight or obese, and these numbers rising at an alarming rate, we saw a need for a personalized, science-based strategy to help bend the curve,” said Abraham, who co-founded Found with Emily Yudofsky of Atomic.
While there are some point solutions for a certain drug or treatment, Found was founded to provide “a holistic, personalized, and precision-based solution to aid anyone trying to lose weight,” according to Abraham.
To help its members accomplish their particular weight and health objectives, the business uses “dozens” of drugs, supplements, diet regimens, exercise routines, and coaching programs, according to him.
According to co-founder and COO Swathy Prithivi, who served as the company’s temporary CEO before Jones Simmer’s hire earlier this month, Found has helped “tens of thousands” of members shed over 200,000 pounds since its 2020 launch. It is presently offered in 31 states for an average monthly cost of $100, with a choice of plans to choose from.
“A lot of what inspired Found was the realization that obesity is a sickness, not a choice, and that it’s past time for us to modernize weight care so that obesity is treated as a disease rather than a choice,” she told TechCrunch.
Prithivi went on to say that weight is a category that is “highly stigmatized.”
“We’ve all been advised to eat less and move more, and then humiliated for our lack of willpower when we don’t see results,” she added, “but there’s very little success to be seen when 50% of Americans are on diets and only 5% lose weight.” And this despite decades of studies demonstrating that losing weight and keeping it off requires more than simply a healthy diet and regular exercise.”
