AVOKADIO, a Turkey-based startup that offers breath analysis of dietary habits and their effects on metabolism, already went global without receiving any funding. Aiming to lead the way to a healthier diet for everyone, the company is set to go global by providing solutions for global health problems.
Founded nearly three years ago, Avokadio began with a project that aimed at determining infections in intensive care patients in the early stages through breath analysis. The goal of the study, which aimed to detect infections by monitoring the gases exhaled by patients instantly, was to develop a practical and innovative solution through nano-technology sensors instead of expensive and difficult-to-use devices, according to Yunus Konmaz, the company’s CEO. “Although we achieved some successful results in the study, as a startup, we decided to turn to another field when we faced the financial and regulatory difficulties of developing a medical device,” he said. “One of the most important problems in the modern age is obesity and the harmful eating habits associated with it.”
PROVIDING REMOTE HEALTH DATA
The company, which measures the acetone and ammonia levels in breath to determine how a person’s dietary habits impact their metabolism, uses this data to offer a new, data-driven and personalized diet experience supported by artificial intelligence. “We are developing a ‘reinforcement learning’ algorithm that gives the most accurate recommendations by following the nutritional habits of the user – which foods the user wants to consume – and their impacts on their metabolism with biometric data,” Konmaz continued.
“We combine the data with the users’ height, weight, age and the foods that users want to consume on the server with breath analysis data. From the moment the user logs in, the basic algorithm is determined with the help of dieticians and starts to receive dietary advice with our model. During the process, we provide the user with alternatives and nutritional recommendations with our model. We provide the opportunity to change what they do not want and we follow the biometric data at the same time. With this data, the model will gradually begin to train itself to be user-specific so that we can recommend products that the user likes but also best suited to their metabolism.”
JAPAN AND THE U.S. ALREADY ON BOARD
Despite the goal of helping users improve their nutritional habits, prevent the occurrence of chronic diseases such as diabetes and benefit social health, the company hasn’t received any investment. Nonetheless, Avokadio has won awards from Migros, Eksim Yatirim, Elginkan Vakfi and Petrol Ofisi at the ITU Big Bang Startup Challenge. “Also, we received incentives from Bahcesehir University for our clinical trials,” Konmaz said.
Although the company is not on the radar of investors yet, it has already established a branch in the U.S. “Because of the high number of overweight people there the demand for our products from the U.S. market is high and we established a sales and business development organization,” Konmaz continued. “Together with a former serial entrepreneur, an American experienced in business development and marketing, we formed a sales team of three people. We offer solutions not only for obesity but also for nutrition and exercise tracking. We especially target university athletes. Other than that, we received cooperation requsts from some Japanese companies. Our work for the Japanese market continues to meet that demand.”
