SINGAPORE – Having built up Singapore’s largest personal finance community for the last seven years, Seedly co-founders Kenneth Lou and Chew Tee Ming are now on their next venture, an AI-powered health-tech start-up.

Unveiled on Tuesday, Mito Health has been in stealth mode for the past eight months and raised $1.7 million in January in an oversubscribed pre-seed funding round.

The fund-raising round was led by Forge Ventures, with participation from angel investors such as founders and executives from ShopBack, Carousell, PatSnap, Glints, Singlife, Rainforest and Ohmyhome.

The pre-seed funding will go towards hiring and product development.

Mr Lou, 30, and Mr Chew, 32, left Seedly in late 2022. They had sold Seedly to ShopBack in 2018, and ShopBack sold it subsequently to Hyphen Group in 2020. 

On why they left Seedly, Mr Lou said: “After almost seven years at Seedly, we decided it was the right time to move on. As entrepreneurs, we thrive on the excitement of starting new ventures from scratch. So we collaborated with our management team to ensure a smooth transition of the business to capable hands before embarking on our next journey.”

They co-founded Mito Health with fellow Singaporeans Joel Kek, who was tech lead of TraceTogether during his time at the Government Technology Agency, and Dr Ryan Ware, a doctor in public hospitals for the past seven years.

Launched as a subscription service, Mito Health creates personalised health plans for customers based on their health screening results and data from wearable devices to increase the number of years lived free from disability and diseases.

As a start, Mr Lou, who is chief executive of Mito Health, hopes to change the health check-up and screening experience from something that is burdensome to something that people will find interesting and look forward to.

Currently, athletes and the ultra-rich have teams dedicated to improving their health and performance, but this is not something most people can afford.

The Mito Health team hopes to lower these cost barriers with AI, making such personalised action plans accessible to anyone who is health conscious.

Right now, Mito Health’s services have been made available only to a handful of clients as the firm is finalising the exact subscription fee, which will be set by mid-year.

Eventually, clients will pay a few hundred dollars for an initial customised health screening, as well as a monthly subscription. Users can also opt out of the screening and provide their latest results.

Customers will work with their doctors and leverage AI to co-create a one-year health plan based on their risk profile, health goals and commitment levels.

This plan will cover areas such as nutrition, exercise, sleep, mental health and medication or supplements.

“With tech improvements, we definitely hope to see the subscription prices come down,” said Mr Lou.

He added: “We have an extensive set of blood tests and scans available for clients when they go for the initial health screening, but each client’s health plan will be customised based on their personal risk, family history and goals. Our goal is not to sell our clients the most number of tests, but to select those that truly matter to them.”

The death of Mr Lou’s father at the age of 54 after a four-year battle with brain cancer, while Seedly was in its early years, led him to do something in the healthcare space. 

“Towards the end of my dad’s life, it was incredibly sad and emotional to see someone who was incredibly fit, energetic go through all the radiation and chemotherapy. It was pretty much a death spiral, where the doctors could only manage his pain, and try their best to treat this aggressive form of cancer,” he said.

“His story is just one of so many – not just in Singapore, but across the world – who are going through some form of disability and disease.”

Mr Lou added: “It really shone a spotlight on the adage that health is true wealth, even as we were aggressively pushing concepts of ‘$100,000 by 30’ or ‘financial independence, retire early’ (Fire) movement daily at Seedly.”

Having $100,000 in savings by the age of 30 is a goal for young people aiming for financial stability. Meanwhile, the Fire movement advocates aggressively saving and investing somewhere between 50 per cent and 75 per cent of one’s income, with the aim of early retirement by one’s 30s or 40s.

Mr Lou added circumspectly: “There is no good future when there are no healthy years, period.”