Last month, wearable tech startup Ultrahuman reported ₹620 crore in revenue for the full year 2024, marking strong progress in its global growth journey.

From Deliveried to Devices

In 2015, Mohit Kumar and Vatsal Singhal co-founded Roadrunnr, a startup built to simplify last-mile logistics.

Within a year, they acquired TinyOwl and rebranded the business as Runnr. In 2017, Zomato acquired Runnr in a deal reportedly valued at $40M, bringing Mohit and Vatsal into the company.

At Zomato, Mohit led operations as COO of Food Delivery, while Vatsal was in charge of product and engineering.

Together, they played a crucial role in scaling the delivery business, building out systems for fleet management, order allocation, and logistics optimisation nationally.

By 2019, after nearly two years at Zomato, they decided to step away and explore what they wanted to build next. Both took time off, each diving into personal interests around health and performance.

Mohit travelled to Thailand and enrolled at Tiger Muah Thai, a martial arts training camp. In between intense training sessions, he noticed something unexpected.

Athletes were wearing Glucose Monitors, a device he had only associated with diabetes management. It turned out that these athletes were using CGMs to track how their bodies responded to food, exercise and overall body recovery in real time.

Meanwhile, Vatsal had also become deeply invested in his fitness journey, particularly through CrossFit.

Though they were on separate paths, both had arrived at a similar insight: health tracking in its current form was outdated. The existing tools were either too complex or passive or designed to manage illness and not optimised for everyday health.

When the two reconnected, it wasn’t with a pitch or a product in hand but with shared experiences.

Both had independently noticed how fragmented and reactive the world of health monitoring was.

Wearables were everywhere. 

In India, 3M wearables were sold in 2018, but most focused on surface-level metrics. Devices like CGMs offered deeper and more meaningful insights, but they were confined to clinical use.

They began asking bigger questions. Why was real-time health data limited to medical scenarios? What if people could access and act on their bodies' internal signals daily—before problems appeared?

They weren’t trying to build another fitness tracker. The idea forming in their minds was closer to a metabolic operating system, something that could simplify complex biological signals and help people make better decisions about their health with minimal friction.

That became the early blueprint for what would turn into Ultrahuman in 2019. But what they were attempting wasn’t obvious. 

Two founders known for logistics and delivery were venturing into biology, sensors, and health. And they weren’t doing it from Silicon Valley but from Bangalore, without a playbook, a hardware ecosystem, and the automatic trust that global health brands enjoy. 

The leap was credibility itself.

Right Product, Right Time

Ultrahuman’s launch came just before the pandemic, and the timing couldn’t have been better.

As COVID spread, people became more conscious of their health and the need to invest in it. This shift in awareness provided the perfect tailwind for Ultrahuman, which aimed to bring attention to metabolic health, a problem affecting over a billion people globally.

Metabolic disorders, including high blood sugar, blood pressure, cholesterol, and abdominal fat are linked to 85% of all chronic illnesses worldwide. Beyond the health impact, they place enormous pressure on already burdened healthcare systems.

Despite this, the tools available to consumers were basic.

Wearables like Apple Watch or Fitbit could track steps and heart rate but lacked real-time metabolic insights. They showed how fast your heart was beating, not how your meals or habits affected your body from within. 

Diet apps like HealthifyMe or Sugar.fit helped with plans but relied heavily on self-reported data, making sustained behaviour change difficult.

Ultrahuman saw an opportunity to offer a new approach using continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) to provide real-time visibility into how the body responds to food, movement, and recovery.

In 2021, they launched the Ultrahuman M1 (also known as Cyborg), a small CGM patch worn on the arm. It streamed glucose data to the app in real time, giving users a live view of their metabolic health. 

Built on proven clinical-grade sensors, the device was backed by years of use in diabetes care and sports science.

But turning a clinical device into a consumer product wasn’t easy. CGMs were designed for diabetics, not healthy professionals. Most people had never heard of “glucose optimisation.” The price seemed steep, and the patch felt medical. Hardly any other players existed that did the same. 

The real differentiator was what they did with the data. 

The Cyborg was built on proven clinical-grade hardware, similar to devices used in diabetes care and sports science. Ultrahuman used medical-grade sensors that had been used with decent accuracy in the sports technology domain for the last 6-7 years. 

Notably, the team was able to abstract away the stream of data and present it as insights that the user could act on. 

This was enabled by an AI-driven engine that analysed glucose trends and triggered feedback. For instance, if your glucose rises too high, the app would send an alert and suggest you take a walk or do a quick exercise to reduce your levels​.

This instant, personalised feedback did not exist in mainstream fitness trackers then. As Ultrahuman’s website put it, the goal was to “optimise your lifestyle” by closing the loop between biometrics and action.

Paired with aspirational design and early adoption by influential athletes, the M1 created buzz even while in private beta. 

It began a new category where users could finally understand and optimise their bodies in real time.

Finding Their Footing

Ultrahuman didn’t start as a metabolic tracking app or ecosystem.

The initial vision was broader. To build a platform that makes health and fitness more data-driven.

This meant the company's initial focus was creating a holistic wellness app that combined workout routines, meditation, sleep coaching, and integration with wearables, all tied together through a consistent, personalised experience.

When Ultrahuman first launched globally at CES 2021, it was introduced as a “fitness platform to help people meditate, work out, and optimise their sleep” with content from world-class coaches. 

Its Apple Watch integration for live biofeedback was touted as a first-of-its-kind feature​. The app won accolades at CES, including being named the “Best Fitness Product” of CES 2021, signalling early recognition of Ultrahuman’s innovative approach.

Observing the massive preventive health potential, the team decided to double down on metabolic tracking with the launch of the Cyborg in private beta in June 2021. The launch garnered huge interest – by August, Ultrahuman reported “thousands” on the waitlist and 60% week-over-week growth in signups for the CGM service.

The momentum for such a device is what made it so rare. 

Health-tech funding usually flowed to clinical solutions or wellness apps with low operational risk. Ultrahuman was doing the opposite by shipping physical biosensors, targeting non-patients, and building a new category from a market not known for global health brands. 

It was expensive, risky, and operationally heavy. That a startup could create this kind of pull signalled something more significant: that real-time health data was no longer a clinical tool. It could be a consumer habit.This traction helped validate metabolic health as a new consumer category, and investors took notice.

In 2021, Ultrahuman secured $17.5M in Series A funding, backed by a lineup of marquee investors and industry leaders across the startup and healthcare ecosystem.

With this capital, Ultrahuman accelerated product development (improving sensor tech, exploring additional biomarkers like HRV and sleep data​) and plans to expand its metabolic fitness service internationally.

Within a year of its launch, Cyborg had amassed 14,000 paid users and another 140,000 people on the waitlist. Social media buzzed with user testimonials, many describing how the product helped them finally understand their bodies.

What began as a wellness app was now well on its way to becoming a full-stack metabolic health ecosystem.

Next Wave

Ultrahuman was carving out a niche at the intersection of wearable health tech, preventive healthcare, and metabolic health optimisation, all fast-growing verticals within the broader digital health ecosystem. 

This placed Ultrahuman in a strategic white space: between consumer fitness apps like Fitbit or HealthifyMe, and clinical-grade glucose monitoring for diabetics. 

They created a new category, metabolic optimization for performance, energy, and longevity.In 2022, the global wearables market was valued at $80B, and it is projected to cross $150B by 2030, growing at a ~14% CAGR.

As consumers moved from reactive care to proactive health management, Ultrahuman was well-positioned to ride that wave. However, the team was intentional about framing the product.

Rather than positioning the CGM as a medical device, the company focused on making it aspirational. 

Their messaging targeted what they called the “silent epidemic” - people with undetected or suboptimal metabolic performance. 

That included pre-diabetics (~1 in 3 adults globally), people trying to lose weight, boost energy, and improve sleep, and those deeply engaged with fitness and longevity science.

This prevention-first mindset shaped their early user base.

Ultrahuman’s early adopters were primarily urban, digitally-savvy professionals aged 25 to 40.

Many were existing users of devices like Apple Watch, Oura, and Fitbit, and followed thought leaders like Huberman or Peter Attia. They were comfortable paying $50–$250/month for tech-enabled wellness and were quick to share their experiences online, amplifying word of mouth.

This demographic only grew post-COVID, as preventive health spending soared. The global trend showed wellness shifting from reactive to proactive, with consumers wanting tailored insights, continuous tracking, and “smart coaching,” all of which Ultrahuman delivered.

It was never just about tracking glucose. Ultrahuman tapped into a more profound shift.

People want to understand their bodies, not fix them after the fact. These weren’t patients, but individuals asking sharper questions: Why did I feel low energy today? How did that meal affect me?

Ultrahuman gave them answers with data.

It started as a product, became a habit, and slowly began to shape a new kind of health system in which the individual was in control.

Rings, Revenue, and the Roads

By FY22, the momentum had started to build. Revenue jumped INR 7 cr, led primarily by the M1 CGm, a premium, subscription-based product aimed at high-intent users.

This growth validated early demand for metabolic health tracking and revealed the model’s limitations.

The M1 CGM came bundled with a 14-day sensor, a software layer of AI-driven insights, and personalized coaching. While it offered immense value, it was expensive to deliver and challenging to scale.

Priced at over INR 1.3 lakh per annum, the product attracted elite biohackers, performance athletes, and longevity enthusiasts but left out the broader health-conscious audience.

Retention, too, was hard. 

While powerful, glucose wasn’t a sticky enough metric for users without a clinical need.

As revenue grew, so did operating complexity. Due to reliance on third-party CGM sensors, procurement and delivery costs were high. 

India wasn’t built for consumer-grade health hardware. There were no fast-turn prototyping labs, no vertically integrated vendors, and limited expertise in wearables. Every design change was slow, and every supply delay hit timelines. Even tiny UX missteps threatened trust, like skin irritation from adhesives or app sync issues. Yet, Ultahuman kept pushing forward despite all these challenges. 

By FY22, Ultrahuman’s cost of acquisition and service had outpaced revenue, with the company spending INR 9 to earn INR 1. The product had substantial value but hadn’t found proper product-market fit.

Mohit and the team realized they needed to widen their target segment and address more mainstream health problems, such as sleep, stress, and recovery, without relying on expensive hardware and subscriptions.

Recognising this, Ultrahuman began reshaping its product roadmap, aiming to serve a broader base of users with a lower-friction hardware experience.

A major step in this direction came in 2022, with the acquisition of LazyCo, a consumer hardware startup known for its minimalist productivity device, ‘Blinks’. 

While LazyCo wasn’t in the health space, its hardware design and manufacturing expertise gave Ultrahuman a vital edge. It marked the company’s first move toward building in-house wearable tech, laying the groundwork for a more scalable, consumer-ready platform.

Later that year, Ultrahuman launched its first Smart Ring (R1), a one-time purchase alternative to the CGM, focused on tracking sleep, activity, and recovery. 

The R1 appealed to a broader audience, combining minimalist form, innovative functionality, and plug-and-play adoption.

Instead of a subscription plan, it sold the ring as a one-time purchase. By solving for more generic data-driven insights like sleep and stress patterns and removing the requirement to pay for an expensive subscription, Ultrahuman massively expanded its target segment.

By the end of FY23, the company had revenue of INR 30 cr, but it was still spending INR 3.3 to earn INR 1 in revenue. 

However, Ultrahuman cracked a working business model with a strong PMF for one of its products and demonstrated a path to profitability. 

It soon released an improved version of the R1, called the ‘Air,’ and offered optional subscription-based software ‘plugins’ such as enhanced heart health tracking and warranty services. 

The foundation was reset. It was time to scale and scale fast.

Scaling with Precision

By FY24, Ultrahuman had shifted gears. What began as a niche health-tech startup was scaling like a consumer hardware juggernaut.

From INR 7 crore in FY22 to INR 107 crore in FY24, Ultrahuman’s revenues had grown 15x in just two years, powered by a clear product-market fit, a well-executed SKU strategy, and a hybrid model blending high-margin software with premium-grade wearables.

The Air Smart Ring had emerged as the hero SKU, accounting for 75% of FY24 revenue. It wasn’t just selling more, it was selling better. 

Between January 2023 and December 2024, the average order value for the Air nearly doubled from USD 224 to USD 412, driven by upsell plug-ins and high retention.

What made the growth even more compelling was the operational discipline.

Ultrahuman cut advertising expenses by ~40%, kept employee costs flat, and moved CGM production in-house to Bangalore, lifting gross margins on the ring to over 50%. 

Its spend-to-earn ratio dropped from INR 3.3 to INR 1.3, and losses were halved, falling from INR 71 crore in FY23 to INR 39 crore in FY24.

To fuel its next phase, Ultrahuman raised $35M in Series B in March 2024, taking its total funding to $65M. Zomato’s Deepinder Goyal also joined as an investor. With fresh capital, Ultrahuman doubled down on the Air ring, scaling up production in India and the US. 

A new manufacturing facility in the US added 200,000 ring units in capacity annually, key for its fastest-growing market (now contributing 30% of total revenue). Simultaneously, its Bengaluru plant scaled 15x, strengthening supply for the Indian market (25% of revenue share).

But the strategy wasn’t limited to supply.

Ultrahuman broke away from the online-only D2C playbook of its peers (like Oura and Whoop) and positioned its product as a luxury health accessory. 

The company launched 150+ high-end retail stores globally, placing the ring in premium locations like Selfridges in London and Virgin Megastore in Dubai. 

A luxury version of the ring, made from precious metals and priced at $2,200 (~INR 2 lakh), further pushed the brand into elite consumer territory.At the same time, Ultrahuman expanded its customer base, especially among women. 

Between 2023 and 2024, the share of women users grew by 11 percentage points, hitting ~44%. 

Key drivers included new features like menstrual cycle tracking, fertility window predictions, and pregnancy-focused health insights, all tailored to individual needs and conditions.

By the end of CY2024, the company was on track for INR 600+ crore in FY25 revenue, with the Air ring contributing 90% of sales. Most importantly, it had done so profitably, declaring a PBT margin of 11%.

But Ultrahuman wasn’t stopping there.

Determined not to be a one-product company, it reinvested ~20% of profits into R&D, with work underway on the Ultrahuman Home (a device for monitoring indoor environmental health), and an upcoming at-home blood diagnostics product suite, signaling its ambition to build the full-stack health ecosystem.

Ultrahuman had scaled. Now, it was building for permanence.

Standing Out in a Crowd

As Ultrahuman scaled, so did the competition and competing in wearables is like showing up to a Formula 1 race on a bicycle. 

Apple owns the ecosystem. Fitbit and WHOOP own market recall. Oura owns design and sleep. Most startups don’t stand a chance unless they refuse to play by the same rules.

That’s precisely what Ultrahuman did.

Where competitors scaled through heavy ad spends, Ultrahuman asked: What if we didn’t advertise at all? This wasn’t a philosophical stance; it was an operating constraint. 

In the CY24 annual report, the company mentioned spending nothing on marketing. They are driven by a belief that their users weren’t the type to click on ads anyway. 

They were high-intent, health-literate, performance-driven people. For them, a glucose graph shared by a founder on Twitter held more power than a billboard ever could. 

And it worked. Over 80% of early growth came from word-of-mouth and organic referrals.

The strategy isn’t just marketing-light. it is precision-led. 

Instead of targeting everyone, Ultrahuman optimized for geographies where it could offer faster delivery, full SKU availability, and better control over the user experience. 

Their logic is clear: advertising makes sense only when supply, service, and product density are high enough to match demand, not before.

On the backend, most consumer tech brands go asset-light. 

Ultrahuman built its supply chain with manufacturing facilities in India and now the US (Indiana), reducing import costs and delays. 

This gave them a rare edge in a category plagued by stockouts and long wait times—the Ring AIR v2 now ships in less than a week across major regions. Most competitors can’t promise that.

Tech strategy followed the same pattern. While others stitched together APIs, Ultrahuman built full-stack, from sensor interface to coaching algorithm. That meant faster iteration, proprietary scoring models, and higher software margins. With gross margins above 60% on software and improving even on hardware, the business isn’t just growing - it’s compounding.

Even pricing tells a story. Ultrahuman sits between mass-market wearables like Fitbit and premium rings like Oura. Still, it delivers layered value with real-time coaching, diagnostics, and personalization that others charge extra for or don’t offer.

However, the global scale brought global resistance. 

In late 2023, Oura filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Ultrahuman in the US. The case is still ongoing, but it sent a clear signal: a startup from Bangalore wasn’t just entering the market. It was now considered a threat. Most Indian startups would back down when a market “leader” took them on, yet Ultrahuman did not. They kept pushing.

While competitors scaled wide and hoped users would stay, Ultrahuman started narrow, built deep trust, and now expands into global markets with repeat rates few in hardware can claim. The question isn’t how many users they have.

It’s how often they come back and why they never leave. Ultrahuman was carving a niche for itself while also expanding the niche as a whole. 

Building Human Health OS

Most health tech companies build tools. Ultrahuman is creating something more ambitious a system that makes health continuous, contextual, and personal.

Not just a wearable. An operating system for the human body. That’s not a metaphor. It’s a business model.

Operating systems work because they integrate hardware, software, and services into one seamless experience. They create lock-in, increase lifetime value, and grow smarter with every new data point.

That’s precisely the path Ultrahuman is following intentionally, layer by layer.

The CGM gave users metabolic visibility. The Ring AIR added recovery and stress data. Blood Vision brought long-term markers into the same interface. 

Ultrahuman Home made that feedback ambient. The Ultrahuman Score tied it all together, one number that adapts in real time based on how your body performs.

Each launch wasn’t just a feature. It was a new sensor in the operating system. Each one improved retention, increased engagement, and created more surface area to build trust and revenue.

But the real shift came when the platform began adapting to context.

During Ramadan, the app adjusted nudges, glucose insights, and behavior scoring to match fasting routines. Ovulation tracking introduced hormonal intelligence into recovery and training suggestions. 

These weren’t just niche upgrades. They signaled a broader strategy: become the most context-aware health platform in the world.

Then came the PowerPlugs, mini software modules that pushed the OS further. AFib Detection enabled early heart rhythm alerts. Smart Alarm optimised wake-up cycles. Social Jetlag showed users the biological cost of irregular schedules. Each plug-in turned the ring into something bigger: a proactive health assistant.

This layered model creates what traditional wearables can’t, essentially a loop of value that improves the more it’s used. That’s the business case. 

More touchpoints. Higher retention. Higher LTV. And a deep moat built on real-time, personalised biology.

With users in 60+ countries, high repeat usage, and growing software margins, Ultrahuman is no longer selling hardware.

It’s selling daily relevance which is the core ingredient of any operating system that wins.

Beyond The Spike

Ultrahuman’s story so far has been one of speed and precision. The company hit the $100M ARR milestone in under five years, faster than most global peers like Whoop, Oura, and Eight Sleep.

The next phase is about depth.

As of 2025, the thesis remains unchanged: the future of health is real-time, personalised, and driven by data from within. But now, the ambition has widened from metabolic tracking to full-spectrum human optimisation.

New biosensors are already in development. They track cortisol (for stress), ketones (for fat metabolism), and lactate (for performance). These are second-gen indicators of how the body is coping, adapting, and recovering. If glucose is the entry point, these markers are the next doors to unlock.

There’s also momentum toward mental health, not through journaling or self-help, but through biochemical feedback. 

Elevated cortisol? Spikes in resting heart rate? Sleep fragmentation? These aren’t just red flags but early warnings of emotional dysregulation. The future version of Ultrahuman could tell you you’re stressed and why and what to do about it.

But hardware is only half the bet. 

The other half is distribution, not through D2C ads or product drops but through integration. 

Ultrahuman is already running pilots with corporate wellness programs and insurance partners, plugging metabolic insights into annual health check-ups, preventive care, and premium pricing.

The idea is that if a CGM can detect insulin spikes early, it can prevent prediabetes. A ring can reduce burnout by detecting sleep disruptions or stress cycles. This moves Ultrahuman from a consumer brand to an infrastructure layer in healthcare, quietly reshaping how people are assessed, coached, and covered.

This expansion is also extending into new health verticals. Ultrahuman has already begun bridging the metabolic and mental health gap with features like the Stress Rhythm Score. 

The roadmap now includes deeper tracking of neurochemical and hormonal markers alongside real-time interventions through breathwork and recovery tools. By connecting stress, sleep and glucose, Ultrahuman aims to build a more holistic framework for wellbeing.

But for every tailwind, there are tests.

Scaling while maintaining product accuracy is difficult, especially with biosensors that push regulatory boundaries. Explaining glucose tracking to the mass market still requires education. Striking the balance between premium pricing and mainstream adoption remains a tightrope.

Still, the long game is clear.

Ultrahuman isn’t trying to be the best wearable in the market. It’s trying to be the most trusted interpreter of your body. It wants to be the brand you turn to when your energy dips, weight spikes, recovery tanks, or motivation fades. 

Not to tell you what’s wrong but to show you what to do.

Eventually, it may not just be you who listens. Insurers, employers, hospitals, and platforms—everyone looking for better outcomes at lower costs will need a way to track, predict, and intervene. Ultrahuman wants to be that interface.

Whether that ends in an IPO, a global health partnership, or an acquisition by a tech or healthcare giant is still unwritten. Ultrahuman has built something more potent than a product in a world chasing longevity. It’s built a reason to believe that better is not just possible, it’s measurable.

Against all odds, an Indian brand has built hardware not just for India but for the world. It looks like it is just getting started.

Writing: Parth, Raghav, Samarth, Shreyas, Tanish, Varun and Aviral Design: Omkar