[Mo] Entrepreneurs, especially starting out, you hear so many notes and there's so much rejection, and you have to get used to that because you're gonna hear rejection throughout your entire life. The most important thing, though, is to make sure that you believe in your idea and that you have validated it. Right? I mean, everyone can have an idea. Most of of them are probably bad. But if you truly believe in the idea and you just believe that it's missing that spark, I would say you haven't found the right partner. Right? So you've gotta go find the right partner and and yeah. [Kamal] Hey, listeners. In this episode of Tech in 26.2 pod, I sit down with Mohammed Iqbal, the founder and CEO of Sweatworks, a product focused health and wellness digital agency based in Virginia with offices in Europe and also in Asia. Sweatworks works with brands like Nike, Strava, Garmin, Bose, to name a few. In fact, in addition to being an endurance athlete himself, Mohammed is also an investor and adviser to health and fitness startups and also host a weekly latest in fitness and wellness health care podcast called Lifts. I sit down and chat with Mohammed about the starting journey of Swetworks. Why did he choose to build a services company when he had the choice of building a product based company, in endurance sports or endurance tech industry. We also talk about how AI is playing a pivotal role and all of the trends he has seen over the last 12 years and what he has seen the industry is heading towards as he worked with multisheet of clients in health and wellness industry. I'm sure you'll enjoy this episode. And if you do, don't forget to subscribe to this channel to get notified when I publish the next episode. Enjoy this episode. Welcome, Mohammed, to this podcast. I'm really excited to have you here. [Mo] Kamal, thank you so much for having me on. Great. So I'll start with you what I found, as a quick introduction to Mohammed Iqbal, who is he. So I'll start with, Mohammed is the founder and CEO of Sweatworks, a product focused health and wellness digital agency based in Virginia, with offices in London, Manila, Miami, Montevideo, New York, and Schengen. You have more than 100 employees. You have 10 plus patents, and you have touched 1,000,000 plus digital lives. SwedeWorks works with brands like Strava, Garmin, Bose to name few. In addition to being an endurance athlete yourself, you are also an investor and an adviser of lot of health and wellness startups. You also have you are the host of a weekly, latest in fitness, wellness, and health care podcast called Lifts. What did I miss, Mohammed? [Mo] You covered a lot. I mean, I've gotta update some of those numbers. Those descriptions always make you sound better than than reality, but but it's all good. No. I'm I'm happy to be on and happy to go go deep and take this wherever you would you you would like it to. [Kamal] Great. So I want to start with, your your starting journey of Sweatworks. I do, understand that you have a fascinating story how the Sweatworks came into being with your background, your past as a childhood. So can you take us back to that story and and how it led to, you know, founding SweatWorks? Yeah. For sure. So, one, I wasn't born in the US. I'm an immigrant. I was born in Dubai. My parents are from Sri Lanka. Oh. And, yeah, they moved to the UAE in 1977, and I was born in 1980. And in 90 1991, we moved to the Americas. And, you know, I think you're an immigrant as well, but I think when I was when I was in the Middle East, life was more homogeneous in that even Dubai was always a multicultural city, but it really wasn't it. It wasn't as people think of Dubai today. Right? It was still still a financial hub, still, you know, heavily expat oriented, but wasn't what it is today. So when I came here, it was a big culture shock to me, and I think, we had so many options that we didn't have over there. Like, just going to the grocery store, the kind of meals you ate, the and just you're just more active. We just, like, moved around more. I played soccer all the time, and I just did a whole bunch of things. And when I came here, I kind of dove all in, and, you know, I I kinda consumed a lot, and I gained a ton of weight. And in in 1993, I just made a decision to say, you know what? I want to make a change. Like, I don't like the way I look. I don't like the way I feel. I'm the pick of a book called Optimum of Sports Nutrition in 1993, and that really changed the way I thought about nutrition. This is really before I kind of got into the fitness side of it. But the main thing that I saw that taught me a lot about macronutrition and micronutrition. Right? Okay. Carbohydrates, proteins, and fats, and then micronutrients like your vitamins and and minerals, the impact that that can have on you. Mhmm. And at 13, by just making those changes to my diet, I saw a profound change in how I felt and how I looked. I just started just feeling better, and that impacted all aspects of my life. Mhmm. And then I got into fitness, and I got into, you know, running, and I got into playing sports, and I got into a whole bunch of other things. And the main, conclusion that I saw is that if I put in the work and if I make a change, then there's actually a reaction to that. And I think that a piece that a lot of people, both young and old in our country and around the world are missing that they are in the position that they're in, and they don't understand that by making a small change Mhmm. Maybe it's but but by making a change, it can have a positive or negative impact on your well-being. Right. Right? So I was fortunate to see that. And then I went to college and people said, hey. You know, you're gonna get on the meal plan. You you'll you'll gain the freshman 15. I think I was the freshman 20. You know, 1st year of college, and then then you get married, and and all these things, right, happen. And you have a career. You're working 100 hours a week. You're gonna gain weight. And and what I found is none of those things happened to me. That I went to college, and I was actually able to stay in shape. In fact, I got in better shape when I started working, and I still continued with that. And I was and even though I traveled all over the world and I was working a pretty intense job, I made this a part of my life, and that's the key thing that we could talk about later today is it's gotta be a lifestyle. It can't be something that you are saying, I'm just gonna do this for 6 weeks or 12 weeks, but you've gotta find a way to make it a part of your habit and kinda what you do. Mhmm. And from listening to the other guests that you've had on on your show, it sounds like they've also done that as well. Mhmm. And I spent the first 10 years of my life, working for a large electronics company, Shop Electronics, in Moba, New Jersey. It's since relocated to Montvale, New Jersey, but it really taught me a lot. I was part of their executive management program. And in that, I got to basically, every 18 months, I took on a different leadership role. So I learned a lot about boring stuff like ERP system. I did not even know what what an ERP was. Okay. And, I learned a lot about, you know, product management and project management, hardware, electronics, and other components. And, yeah, I mean, one of the key projects that I had to work on early on is we won the bid for the Apple iPhone, and that was a transformative movement for me because when I worked at Sharp, which is very much of a true Japanese company, everything was very tactical and transactional. So if I had a widget, if the widget did the job, that's really all it had to happen. Right? So if I had a button and hit a button in the job of the button, I'm looking at my mic now, was to mute the mic. Mhmm. If you've muted the mic, that was great. But when we worked with Apple, again, we did not know it was Apple at the time, but the requirements are so specific Mhmm. Around the consumer experience that we not have to think about the functional aspect of what that button would do, which is to meet the mic, but the emotional response that that button, gave back to the user. Right. So it really kinda challenged the way we thought about engineering and challenged the way we thought about design and hardware. Mhmm. So I did that for about 4 years. And, you know, all along, I was, you know, living kind of my my wellness life, uncovering new things like what you're doing now, like speaking to thought leaders, just learning more and absorbing a lot about the industry. Right. And then I would go work out and do events and run marathons like you're doing. Mhmm. And I didn't see a lot of technology being applied. So on one hand, in my day job, I was at the forefront of the mobile Internet revolution, mobile computing. So the app store come out in 2,009 when, the iPhone came out with HD camera. Instagram blew up in 2009 because of it. You've got Uber come up, WhatsApp come up, but no no innovation happening aside from Runkeeper in 2009. No innovation happening in the fitness side. Mhmm. And so after a decade, I said, you know, maybe there's an opportunity here for me to bring my innovative kind of thinking and experience in hardware and technology with my understanding of fitness and kind of the things that I know. Right. And to create an agency to serve, the companies that are already in there. And I know we'll kinda talk about the reasons behind a product versus a service company, but that's the back story behind, why I started Swatworx. Oh, fascinating. [Kamal] So you combine your personal passion to stay fit, your your understanding of the industry that you're being part of professionally, and you combined into a business that is service driven, which is awesome way to do it because you are still being passionate, serving your customers who are in your niche of your personal, interest, and then you're serving them as well. Now as you alluded to the fact that Sweatworks is a digital agency services company. Since you understand the hardware side working at Sharp, so you probably, you know, can choose either path. Like, I can build a product because there is no innovation. I can come up with innovative product. [Mo] It can be harder or software versus, you know, you decided to be in the services side of it. Like, how did you do transition? What data points you saw that time that that made sense? Yeah. That's a really good question. So you're absolutely right. When I worked at Sharp as as as a product focused company. Right? Sharp invented the first mechanical pencil. They invented the the the turning table inside a microwave, the the innovations of the cop machine, and so on, Apple TVs. So we were all of we're coming from a product of a mindset, not a services, kind of, company. But what I did see is that when we were at Sharp, and then we needed expertise outside, and we needed a company to be fast and nimble, we hired those companies. I hired agencies on the outside to come in and help me do things that we did not have experiences for. And the other thing which I noticed was that, when you work for a large company, you tend to be more insular in how you think about innovation. Because on the back of your mind, you might spend a couple of hours thinking about innovation a day, but really think about operational and tactical things that you have to accomplish as well. Right. So you're not fully kind of dedicated to that. But besides that, the first idea behind Swatworks and the name Swatworks, we were actually gonna make a fitness app. So before we were a services company, my original business plan, which I wrote in 2010, called out to build a fitness app that pulled in various components. So we were going to focus on endurance. We're gonna focus on strength. I mean, it was really out of its time. Now when I and I once in a while, I'll go back and I'll kinda read this 30 page proposal, which I kind of wrote to myself. And it was so we were actually going to go build the product. So why did I switch to services company? And and here's what happened. One, I am the only investor and the sole investor behind the company. Mhmm. And I knew that if I went into the product side, I was speaking with, like, the founder of Runkeeper as an example at the time. He spent and raised 1,000,000 tens of 1,000,000 of dollars, and the majority of that was spent on acquiring customers. So I knew that even then, it's more expensive, which you can get into into a little bit later. But customer acquisition was gonna be incredibly expensive. And if I wanted to do that, I'd have to go out and raise capital. If I raise capital, I was gonna have a board, I was gonna have, and they were gonna direct, you know, and and and and have leverage over directions. I was like, okay. Maybe I didn't wanna do that. But then I kinda looked into really how difficult it was. And because I had a product mindset, I knew how difficult building a product really is. So I wasn't naive to say that I'm gonna start this thing. I'm gonna build an app, and an app can be done in 3 months. I I really knew the infrastructure, the design, the user experience, the all the work that goes into it. And I was at a I was at a pivotal point before I even founded the company. And I either could say, I'm gonna set up a company to be this consumer focused d two c app product that had a white label component to it, or I'm gonna create a services company. So I went with this concept, and early on, I actually pitched Joe DeSena, who was the founder of Spartan Race. So I met Joe DeSena before I founded, Square Works and, talked to him about this. And he was like, well you know? And and he was also relatively needed to technology. He just started Spartan Race, only had a few 1,000 people run through it at the at the time. Mhmm. In a sense, that's how I met, you know, Troy as well through that circle who introduced the the the the the 2 of us. Mhmm. And I said, you know, I could be better served by working with brands that already have an audience. So if my mission is wellness for all, and that's what I started this company with, even before I had a company, I said, I want to My entire purpose was to find a way to leverage technology so I can enable people to lead healthier lives. Mhmm. And if I just stuck true to that North Star, it didn't matter whether whether I made my own app and I control that Uh-huh. Or whether I worked on the the services side to help other brands accomplish that. And and I chose to go with the latter. Looking back, I don't know what the right decision would have been. I mean, I know a lot of founders who built their own apps who are widely successful. At the same time, we've been able to reach millions and millions of people that I don't know if we would have been able to do that if I did have a services company. [Kamal] Right. That's that's a very good point. In terms of the economics, you you touched on a very good point of customer acquisition cost or CAG that, you know, if I have a product that you have to incur, and it usually triggers that you have to raise fund or the runway is too small for you to you can die before you even see the 1st pay customer there. Did you see that that that trade off that you did was a easier ride in terms of customer acquisition in the services side because you still have to work through, and it can be larger, longer cycle because you're talking about established companies with a established audience. Right? [Mo]That's a really good question, and it's one that I had to learn the hard way. So no. So I did not recognize so could because, again, I came from a consumer background Uh-huh. And I was still in my twenties. Right? I was really thinking about acquiring customers, like consumers. Mhmm. I didn't view business as customer acquisition, but you're absolutely right that they are. So I miscalculated that that was my first mistakes, is to say, what is the cost to acquire a customer? And and and right now, I mean, for us as a company, the cost of acquiring a midsize business is about a $150,000 to $200,000. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. It's very, very high. That's all the expense and the cost that kinda goes into the outreach, the sales process, you know, all the things that we do to acquire a customer. So for every customer we get today, the the ultimate cost for us is between 1.50 to $200,000. So we now have a cap. But when I started the business, I didn't view it that way because I had, you know, a network on my account. I just had to make make a couple of calls, go present, and go pitch. Yeah. Man, it wasn't easy. And and I, you know, before I actually, in fact, had a couple of bites, I had to do over a 100 pitches. Oh, wow. In fact, there's a 126 pitches, and the 126 person said, yes. I will take a chance on this person who's got an idea, but has no traction. So, I underestimated, I think, the difficulty that it that it would take to to start the business. Yeah. No. That's that's yeah. That that should be must be an interesting learning. [Kamal] And what is the cycle time for you with the 150 k investment to for for CAC? Yeah. So, typically, what that leads to with that is a customer that on an annual basis, for us in the service side has a revenue of between 7.50 to just over a1000000, and our average retention for customer is about 3,000,000. So for that amount, we we acquire customer that that hopefully on the on the top line revenue side over the span of the relationship, you know, net us between, I'd say, you know, 1.5 and and and, 3,000,000, so roughly 10%. Oh, wow. Okay. That that's great. And then I'll be also curious because I always love the story of having a first paying customer. You say you have to go to a 125 peaches to get the 126 work and someone taking a chance on you. That's right. How was the experience or who was it or if you're into shared some more into that? Yeah. Well, it's actually Nike was my first customer, believe it or not. Yeah. We built an innovation, a a photo project, with them, but it was it was really difficult. [Mo] Obviously, the the hardest thing, I think, when you hear so many noes repeatedly Mhmm. You start questioning yourself. Right. And and you and you basically say, you know, maybe this industry doesn't need technology. Maybe this industry does need innovation. Maybe things are just fine the way that they are. Mhmm. Right? Because there wasn't a need for it. But but if you truly believe in something, what and and for entrepreneurs, especially starting out, you hear so many noes, and there's so much rejection. And you have to get used to that because you're gonna hear rejection throughout your entire life. Mhmm. The most important thing, though, is to make sure that you believe in your idea and that you have validated it. Right? I mean, everyone can have an idea. Most of of them are probably bad. But if you truly believe in the idea and you just believe that it's missing that spark, I would say you haven't found the right partner. Right? So you've gotta go find the right partner. And and yeah. For for us, it was Nike, and then we work with Spartan Race and Reebok and Equinox and on and on. So Mhmm. Once you get that one, then that increases your profile, and other people are gonna come in and and listen to you. Oh, that's that's fascinating. But have landing your first customer as Nike must be a validation of your crazy ideas you had to solve challenges or opportunities, you know, go after opportunities. So that must be a great feeling after 125 rejections for sure. Yeah. Well, we so I wanna part this because we're probably undercharged. We and the Okay. Project was only $75100. Uh-huh. And I I won't forget that. And and now with the same thing, we'll probably charge a $150,000, right, or more. But, yeah, it was it was definitely interesting. You know, we we still have a relationship with them. But yeah. No. It was it was some validation, but at that point, my main focus was really about innovating and creating a product that could be useful and continue to to bring value. Right? You have to take your mind away from that. And so, okay, now that I won this and I have the that that money that they've given me the check, I now have to prove it and go do the work. Yeah. I know. Looks like you have come a long way. Now if you're thinking about or if you're saying the average return rate is 3,000,000 from the 7 5th or 7 to a 100 to 3,000,000 retainer retainers, that's the long way to come. So that that could be the the life of the relationship would be Oh, okay. Yeah. The life of the relationship is that. But we have to I mean, right right now, I would say that our average project size is about half a1000000, but you're right. So that project was, you know, 700 75100 to half a1000000. We have come a long way. Yeah. Yeah. Congratulations. That's awesome. [Kamal] Now coming back to Sweatworks, I think your your mission is wellness for all. And it's really bold, and I really love it that because it's it's calls out, like, what you specialize, what is your niche, you know, and the core strengths are. Like, how you are even approaching achieving that bold mission? It's 12 years, and it looks like you've done ton of projects, served ton of big names in in the industry. How are you still pursuing that mission? [Mo] That's a good point. I mean, I think right now, I'm looking for brands that have scale. Right? So one of our engagements now is with with the largest gym in in the country called Planet Fitness. Oh, okay. And and I had an opportunity to boot their executive team this morning, but that took time. Right? So if you think about we're now innovating for the largest gym in the country, that did not happen overnight. Mhmm. But as we look to achieve that, I think you really have to true stay true to it, but attack it from multiple angles. So a a part of what we do, we might be innovating with a have this, you know, Ultrahuman Rigonde, which is a new smart ring company based out of India, innovating for them. Right? They're kinda trying to enter with the US. At the same time, working with a gym that has 18,000,000 members. Right. So you you really have to, I think, address all sides of the market, and then also think about what are solutions you could do to those people who aren't even in our field. Right? If you think about the industry Mhmm. In the United States, about 23 percent of the country, which which of the able population belongs to a gym or a health club or a studio. That's it. I mean, but it's highest in the world. Believe it or not, that number is the highest Oh, wow. In the world. Okay. So what we wanna focus on in the next 5 years is to say, how do we get the other 78% of the people that don't belong to a gym, that don't have fitness as a part of their lifestyle? How do we reach them? And there are some levers that have been made available through health care and insurance companies that we're gonna try to do, but, ultimately, we want to reach that people. Mhmm. So, really, how you say 2 to your mission is you gotta start by changing one life. So if if you have a big idea, so I think for entrepreneurs kind of thinking about starting the companies, your your your mission or vision statement needs to be a big idea. But you don't have to do that on the first day. Right? So my focus when I started this company in April of 2012 was to say, I wanna just start by changing one life. And then the second one, and then the second one. I mean, you have run multiple marathons. Right? The race starts with the first step, and then it's the second step. But if you think about 26.2 miles as an entire course, it would seem impossible because you're out of breath when you do a 4 mile training run sometimes. Right? Right. So you've gotta really break it up in pieces, and that's how we started it. And now looking at it now, yeah, we've come a long way, but we continue to have that attitude. It's to say that, you know, yes. Now maybe because of our position, we're able to have these bigger conversations, and we're able to influence a larger audience. Mhmm. But I always go back to that time of the k. I just wanna change one life to start. That's that's a good start. You know? Call it coming back to the fundamentals. Like, if attending 1 life, it can multiply millions and millions. It automatically or organically can happen. One of the things that I love about SwetWorks service offerings is your uniqueness of combining hardware, software, and also using the latest technology, that you integrate into you build the solutions for them. And you call this digital fitness lab. Mhmm. Can you elaborate a little bit more on maybe with an example of a solution that probably you are on now or you but recently built? Yeah. I can talk about a couple, and maybe I'll I'll bring up an example that is spot on to your audience, which is the endurance community. Yeah. Yeah. I've always believed and, again, this really goes back my days at Sharp. Mhmm. My first 5 years at Sharp, I was really focused on hardware. I didn't really think much about the consumer experience. My last 5 years at Sharp, I was focused on both. How do we blend the hardware and software together? And when you look at Apple, and what makes their product so successful is that they are fully integrated from the experience all the way down to the firmware, and now even the chipsets. Right? We're using the m one process where they're making their own silicone. So they've gone really deep. Mhmm. And so when we when I started the this company, I always felt like if we're gonna build a front end experience, we have to understand what we're building it on, and we have to make that experience designed for that platform. So if it's a watch, if it's a smartphone, if it's a tablet, I'm on a Mac right now, like, whatever that is. So I think you've got a and a lot of people, because of the App Store and what the App Store has allowed you to do, kind of really and there's nothing wrong with this, but they really focus on the app. Right? But to have it truly immersive and integrated experience, I think you've gotta go much deeper. Right. That's what we did. And because of that, we have a a great excellent hardware team. We we've built everything from wearables to consoles, power meters, and a whole bunch of other stuff, foot pods. But one example where I think having these two teams together is really helpful and not having 2 different companies is there's a product called Nix Biosensors. I know I should be part of Nix Biosensors. Yeah. I saw saw your case on on their website too. Yeah. I'll put it in the not showing up here. Biosensors is really gaining popularity right now within the endurance community. It tracks your sweat loss. It analyzes it in real time. It tells you the composition of that sweat loss such that it informs you on how to replenish and how to hydrate. It tells you how much you're lost and all that. So that was a pretty sophisticated project, something that they were trying to do before they hired us for many years. Mhmm. But they had 2 different teams. They had a hardware team and had a software team. We brought it all together, and we put everyone in a room and said, we're gonna tackle this problem together. And we did everything from the design on the outside to the chipset on the inside to the mobile app that's that's engaging with the consumer. And what you have is a seamless experience. And whenever we have something on the front end that's wrong, maybe with the algorithm or something's not right, they could just either Slack or call someone into Zoom. It's all the same company. Right? Right. So they're no finger pointing. We own it. We own the full stack. It makes it better for our client. In this case, it's Nix. It makes it better for our team. Mhmm. And we're all achieving the same goal together. [Kamal] Oh, no. That's amazing. And and but you did end to end End to end. From the user experience, for Nix? Yes. [Mo] And and even manufacturing. Oh, you did the manufacturing too for NICS? As well. Yes. So we also do the manufacturing in China as well. So literally everything from design to ideation to firmer. And I think because we're able to control that, especially for smaller companies that we might see and, look, even a Planet Fitness in our world is a small company compared to an Apple. Right? Yeah. Those things matter. The fact that we have this capabilities and skill set in our own small company Right. Matters. And as far as I know, we're the only company in the US that actually does both of those things in fitness today. Oh, wow. Yeah. [Kamal] But with because I I do do not see as I am, my podcast focuses on Tech in 26.2. It's a very niche. I haven't seen anyone else doing what you do at SwedeWorks, like end to end solutions for endurance companies or in a technology company serving health and wellness industry as such, which is, really fascinating to learn and and and know about that. As you are building these solutions, I would guess you have access to a lot of data that you see and you learn or you know about the industry data. One of the things that fascinates me and I I talked to, Troy on this one, and I probably know because, you know, Troy personally. Especially in endurance sports, I do feel like it's there is a data issue. It's not that data is not there. It is there, but it's very disintegrated. Like, there are pockets, someone specializing in in certain set of data, like running data. Someone has the running statistics data, but these are disintegrated. As you are seeing those data working with these clients or big brands that you you work with on a regular basis, What trends you are seeing? Do you have a problem, or you think there is a consolidation happening in the industry? Yeah. [Mo] That that's a really good question, Kamal. So I think let's start with endurance first. Yeah. In the scheme of things, a lot of endurance companies are relatively small. Now you need to think about Right. The largest running club in the US is the New York Road Runners. Right. And I think even them, they may have I think it's 600,000 members or 700,000 members. Right. Well, Equinox has more members, like, just one gym. Right? Yeah. Yeah. You know? Planet Fitness has 18,000,000 members. LA Fitness has 7,000,000 members. So the numbers are so much and the this the the NeoCronut is the largest, I would say, most sophisticated, most technology advanced running club probably in the world, right, in terms of its capabilities and what they can do in house, and then the events they put together. Then you look at registration companies. You look at a company like what Bob Bickel has with 1 sign up, which is doing a phenomenal job, and all the incredible things that he's doing, but compare that to the largest payment providers, right, or even what a single gym processes, you know, on on an annual basis. It's no comparison to everyone. The entire racing industry globally is a couple $100,000,000 in in in terms of value. Right? Mhmm. Planet Fitness is worth $5,000,000,000, one company. Right? Right. Peloton, even though they've they've gone down from over 90%, they were 50,000,000,000, but there's still a 1 and a half $1,000,000,000 company. Mhmm. So one thing a part of it is size. So that's one, perspective to keep in mind. So what size gives you is access to resources and access to manage data. And you're absolutely right. That data is completely fragmented. You've got registration data sitting in maybe a platform like run sign up. You've got timing data coming in maybe from a platform like Cook like KronaTrack or Myelabs or or something else. Right. Then you've got people like what Troy did with AppLinked where they try to aggregate all the data to to come together. Mhmm. But that needs expensive data warehouses, data storage, data scientists, right, to be able to bring it. Then you need to have APIs, and then there has to be a mutual interest to somebody where bringing that consolidated data is valuable. And I think there might have been players, like like, maybe Aptiv, you know, might have had a chance to do it. Mhmm. But, again, the juice isn't worth the squeeze if that's the term people use. But the juice isn't worth the squeeze and that it wasn't Yeah. Valuable enough. However, I do believe that I said this is my first you know, my entire company was built around data because Right. We use data to really help understand the customer. We hyper segment the data. We create custom journeys for you. We serve you up relevant, you know, content, whether it's programming or whatever based off of data. We use data to help build programs. Today, with AI, it's supercharged at. So what I was able to like, when I had a team of, like, 30 people before, I can now do with a team of 3, because AI helps you analyze data at a speed and at a volume that was not available before. So in order to make AI work, in order to make these LLM models work that we're building, you need to have an incredible amount of data. So for the running industry and I'm working on a couple of projects with some large shoe companies, like, I I can't really disclose now. Mhmm. But I think I will say this. Companies like Strava Mhmm. Like Runkeeper and others that are collecting a large amount of data, I think are going to be at a leadership point in terms of doing something with that, and they already are. Right. For the endurance of yeah. I so I don't see I guess, it's simpler to say that. Do I see data innovation happening at the event side? There's gonna be some, but I don't think anything is significant. On the registration side, probably not. But, again, some to serve the registration need, but nothing that is going to be holistic. Right. But where I see that happening is gonna be I noticed you have an Apple Watch. Mhmm. Right? Yeah. Just look at you know? And I have a Polar. Look at what Apple just released at, at the worldwide developer conference 2 days ago. Right. That they thought they released a new app called the vitals app. They're giving you training loads similar to what an endurance watch does. Yeah. They're give they already give you metrics on on your power and pay all these things, all based off of data. So I think data innovation in our industry is going to happen at the macro level, looking at wearable company, data aggregators like Strava and others. Yeah. But but not really at the event side. [Kamal] Yeah. No. That's a very good good perspective, for sure. If I wear my consumer hat on, so you talked about from an industry point of view that how you're seeing that the data is helping them or putting them in a position where they can leverage, and leveraging AI on top of it. But if I put on the consumer hat, like I'm a, say, endurance athlete, do you see a similar trend where, you know, you know, willing to use more tech into your routines has led to collection of those data that, you know, companies are leveraging that. Do you see any trend, like, if you're as you are working with clients and their experiences, the persona that you've talked about, 12 versus ago versus now, has that, you know, landscape changed or evolved? Significantly. Yeah. So I've always said wearables is, like, the 3rd dimension. Right? [Mo] So if you think about the first dimension being a digital platform let's just let me correct that. 1st dimension is physical. You come to an event. You walk into a gym. You you can kind of collect data from experiences that you're seeing. When do you check-in? What time do you come in? What equipment do you use? Yeah. The second dimension is digital. But how do you experience my brand on a website or or on a mobile app? Like, how are you interfacing with me? And then we could kinda cure an experience there. The third, I would say is wearables. Right? Because now we know not only what you're doing when experiencing our product, if you're a gym or an event, but also what you're doing outside. And then we can inform you on those decisions outside of the club such as that you do better in the club. So here's an example. Right? If we're able to say that, you know, alcohol or coffee, when you have that you you know, for me, for instance, having caffeine late or having alcohol late at night really impacts my sleep and my recovery. Mhmm. So my gym could tell me, hey, Moe. Don't do these things because we know you like to come in to work out at, you know, 7 in the morning. So in order for you to get good sleep and come in, you know, to achieve your fullest potential, we recommend that you don't drink caffeine after 5, and you don't have you have your last drink at 7 or something like that. I see. So it's it's given us this whole new angle that we didn't have before, and that is only accelerating. Now, what I do see happening though is, you know, you might have several devices. For instance, on my left hand, I have an Oura ring and have a full that. Yeah. Right? On my right hand, I have an Ultimate District because we're we're testing this. Yeah. Usually, I don't have something on my right hand. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know and and a lot of people that have an aura might have an Apple Watch or something else. But I think that there's going to be a consult oh, we talked about nicks for sweat collection. Mhmm. What I think is gonna happen in the next 5 years is consolidation. And I think that there is going to be some level of fatigue around data that people are gonna get overwhelmed with data. Right? So we we're very cognizant of that. And I think when you look at even what Apple did, you know, a couple days ago talking about the rings, you might have seen that. Yeah. They've been out to pause on the I think that's fantastic. Because what I've noticed with people on Apple Watch is that they always are driving to closer rings. All this close ring, close ring. Well, that's what sometimes closing the not closing ranks is okay. Yeah. But then they don't get their streaks. So I think streaks are important because it's a, you know, it's an important, like, emotional achievement. You know, Apple understood that. Mhmm. So I think we're understanding that data is excellent, and we could lead better lives because of data and wearables. But you don't want it to overstress you either. Yeah. Because now as a consumer has so much choices. Like, you are wearing 3 technologies in your 2 you know, both of your hands. It's like there are more choices now. You may put a hoop belt as well. You know, that that's so many options you have. Educating myself as a consumer is a big deal, and I think a lot of companies are trying to do that way too. Another way of looking at it, and I I'll be curious your perspective on this one is, there are so much if I go to app, like, for example, I have, say, you have. And if I go go to the app, the data it's collecting, there are ton of data has been collected. How does someone make a sense of it? I do see there is a gap. There is a long way to go. Like, okay. You're collecting so much data. How do I figure out, like, what should I listen to? Like, what do I should care about? Right? I can tell you that it's coming. And even with brands like OAR, I can tell you it's coming. And one of the challenges that these companies have or have rather is that they start collecting the data. They start building out these recommendation models. But to build a good model, guess what you need? A lot of data. Okay. Right? So Yeah. It's like, you know, the chicken or the egg thing. Right? So in order to get the recommendations, you need to collect the data. So now companies like Apple, because they've they have, you know, over 10,000,000 in, like, they sell off 10,000,000 watch a year, probably has the most data, or, you know, these companies are now gonna start looking at the data that they've been collecting over the last several years. Right. And now helping drive actionable changes. And in fact, the Ultrahuman one of the things that I noticed in the Ultrahuman app is it actually tells me now and say, hey. You know, in order to achieve the most stimulant based response, drink caffeine within these hours. So it's already telling me in the app what to do, and I've only had this thing for a few days, but but that just tells me where things are going. It's gonna happen, but that's the I get that question a lot where okay, Ora told me I slept bad. Now what? Ora told me that my my recovery score is bad. Well, okay. What does that mean? Yeah. And how do I change my day? So I've tried to do that. I do try to look at my recovery score and and hopefully that informs my behavior. But that's because I'm in the industry, and I talk to people like you and all these other leaders where I know. Mhmm. But for the average consumer, how are they gonna know? So I would just say sit tight. You'll see a lot of new innovations coming out this year That's gonna help further inform that. Yeah. [Kamal] So for my audience, then it's probably actionable insights are coming as the industry is learning more and more, figuring out what data or what actions a person should do next based on the data they just sculpted or observed there. You touched on the AI side a little bit more. I'll also curious to get your perspective on especially on the endurance tech. We talked a little bit of consolidation. You talked about fragmented data points. [Mo] How is the industry you you see that's changing as as AI is becoming prevalent pretty much every technology or every solution that is there? Well, I think AI today is is incredibly frothy. And one thing I would caution people of is to say, as we have an AI notetaker on the Zoom call, Yes. I would caution people of overthinking AI. So when we think about AI, we're not looking for a problem to solve with AI. Mhmm. AI is a tool for us to solve a problem. And that's something that is, you know, really important. So so I I think, you know, AI is going to have an impact, especially as we look to use all this data to help train large language models, which is then gonna help drive the recommendations in the next set of answers that come through. Mhmm. But but I think, like, right now, there's so much noise around AI. It's almost like the Internet in 1998. Right? Right. Where it's hard to see, like, where the chips are gonna fall. And I'll I'll give you a a simple example. In in 1998, the DOJ sued Microsoft because all we knew was Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer was a part of every operating system. Right? And what did they have in there? They had their own search engine called Bing. Right. And if the government didn't step in, we would be saying, I'm gonna Bing this. But what happened? The government stepped in, and it said, no. You cannot default a search engine or browser on your OS, and then Google was formed. And now we're saying, I'm gonna Google something. Mhmm. That very thing is happening in AI. But in 98, how many people knew about Google? They'd be thinking about about they're thinking about Bing, maybe Yahoo, like, companies. That's escape. Right? Yeah. But that's where we are today in AI. So before people run towards one direction Mhmm. I think most people, and we're certainly trying to do that, is to keep an open mind. Mhmm. And look what the options are. And, obviously, there are you you're seeing cases like, you know, OpenAI, for example, is is being sued by the DOJ, and and this is our democracy at work. Right? This is innovation work, and and and I think you're gonna see companies come up. But right now, there's so much going on in AI. You're right. AI isn't seemingly everything, but as a business, as a consumer Mhmm. I would definitely be cautious around how you use it. And and I'll give you one one other, you know, point is you look at chat gpt, which is a tool I use, and I'm sure you you use. Mhmm. When you look at when you Google something, you could at least see what the source is. You could say, okay. I'm looking at I'm googling something. It's going to Wikipedia. And if you remember, the early days, Wikipedia was, like, a horrible source. It's gotten better. Like, it was a horrible source. Right? So look. I'm not gonna use that. I'm gonna use something else. So you could see Yeah. What the reference is. But when you ask chat g p t a question, it just gives you an answer. Right. You don't know what the source is. The reference. Yeah. Yeah. So you know what the reference is. So I I think people have to use AI a little bit cautiously, but by all means, I would say, use it. Mhmm. But understand that we are in the very, very early days of AI today. That is that is a very, very good point. I have seen that lot of especially in the endurance tech, Mohammed, that a lot of companies are spinning up, using AI, and I'm not sure what is your take on it. For example, in one industry, probably, if if familiar with this, the training or industry or, you know, marathon training or AI based training apps that are popping up, like, every now and then. What is your take on it? Is that the industry that probably kinda ready to be, kinda changed on AI can be leveraged more to build more, better experiences for the athletes? That's a good question. Again, I know how much work and funding goes into a really good AI platform. Mhmm. So what you find is that, you know, entrepreneurs and and, again, sometimes they'll come up with great ideas. I'm not saying they're being malicious about this, but they will build an AI coaching platform on top of a very, you know, available model and be like, look. It's gonna output you a marathon program. I'll put your 5 k program. And you you could do this instead of going to a running coach and getting an actual program written. Personally, I'm not gonna trust a program generated to me from AI because I know that in order to train a model, you need vast amounts of data. Now if a Garmin or a Polar or an Apple comes out with an AI based running coach or running program, I would probably be more willing to accept that than if it's with one of these start up companies. Because to your point earlier, they have the data to be able to do that. We launched an AI coaching app, not running based, but really, you know, just overall workout based for lifetime fitness. Oh, okay. It in June. We started this last summer Mhmm. And we worked with Microsoft Azure to to and and OpenAI on this coaching program. And the first will the alpha release of it in December was a failure. Right? It didn't work. Ah, okay. It's just because we so then we fed it with even more data. We took 10 years of lifetimes personal training data. We fed the model, and then we had the outcomes that we wanted. Right? So initially, we'd only fed it with 3 months worth of training data, and that wasn't enough. So we'd feed it with 10 years worth of training data, and then we got the outcome that we wanted. Most of these companies that are out in the market today do not have access to that type of data. They just don't. So Right. And as a runner, I would say listen to your your coach. My coach is my wife who says next week. But Okay. That's great. But let's let's listen to your running coach if you if you have access to 1, or people that you know who've done it or more established like the Macmillan training program or whatever, more established programs, for now, and have fun with the AI. Kinda see see what it tells you, but I wouldn't rely solely on that. No. It's just a very good point. So, basically, you're suggesting any endurance athlete who want to say go for, hey. I can get a free training plan on this app. Use it with caution because you don't know how much data went in to pop up that training plan for them because they don't have the context. They don't have the vast, majority of the data that went in to generate this planning plan for them. Yeah. So it's it's a cautionary tale that, you know, they have to make sure that they use their own judgment before they could just go with the plan that generated by just a model, from there. Any parting thoughts, Mohammed, for our audience in endurance tech? I think there's a lot of innovation that's gonna happen. I think we're gonna, I think, see big tech companies and fitness companies join forces, and and you've seen examples of this. I mean, High Rocks, for example. I don't know if you know what what High Rocks is or not, but High Rocks, if you haven't, go check it out. It's a it's a 5 k run. You do some obstacles in between or Spartan Race. They're getting a lot of attention from the broader fitness community into it. There's a lot of tech and innovation happening. So I do think that these next 5 to 10 years is going to be incredible for the endurance, community in terms of technology. You even have a company like Apple who are now investing in our field. So lots of excitement to come. This is a good time to be in fitness and to be in technology. No. Thank you. I really enjoyed our conversation, Mohammed, and and and and really learned so much about what you do, what Sweatworks does, and, you know, how you're achieving your mission of wellness for all. So I really appreciate your time. Thanks for having me on, Kamal. Have a great day. Thank you.