Coaching built Healthify. Can GLP-1 drugs power its future?

poha becomes 200 calories. Chapatis, dosas and pooris all become data points.When it started in 2012, the idea felt almost premature. India was only beginning to embrace food delivery apps and venture capital was chasing e-commerce and mobility.

‘Wellness’ was not yet an industry. Healthify began as a simple meal-tracking app, and later introduced personalized coaching to drive accountability and sustained behaviour change. Today, the company claims to have over 40 million registered users.Since its founding, Healthify has raised about $150 million from global investors.

For years, its pitch was simple: technology plus human accountability. An Indian calorie counter, but with a real coach who would notice when you fell off track. In a market crowded with generic fitness apps, that human layer became its moat.But scale in consumer health is unforgiving.

Coaching is high-touch and expensive and subscriptions are fickle. Even with tens of millions of downloads, turning engagement into durable profits is a different challenge altogether.As growth in Healthify’s home market slowed and the economics of coaching tightened, the global weight-loss industry was being reshaped by a new force: GLP-1 drugs. In the US, medications originally developed for diabetes were suddenly transforming obesity care, commanding high prices, attracting insurers and pulling weight management into the clinical mainstream.“Our vision is that the future of weight management is going to be GLP plus AI plus dietitian in the loop.