Naked Labs
- California-based startup Naked Labs just unveiled its flagship product: a high-tech mirror and scale that delivers precise information on your body including weight, height, BMI, and measurements.
- Naked Labs also closed a $14 million funding round led by Founders Fund which included investments from NEA, Lumia, and early Uber and SpaceX investor Cyan Banister.
- Naked Lab's co-founder Ed Sclater says he has ambitions for his product's tech in the fields of retail, medical care, and more.
For Ed Sclater, co-founder of Northern California-based startup Naked Labs, climbing onto the scale isn't just an age-old, necessary but often depressing bathroom ritual; it's an approach to health and fitness that's potentially damaging.
"If you get on a traditional scale, you get a single number - your weight," said Sclater. "The problem is that if you work out, you're going to be losing fat and gaining muscle, but the scale will keep telling you that you've made zero progress. If you're trying to get in better shape, that information is absolutely damaging."
For years, Sclater and his team at Naked Labs have been creating a futuristic mirror that can deliver detailed information about your health including your weight, body mass index, and body measurements (the circumference of your left bicep or the length of your legs, for instance). The product they've created is a sleek 3D body scanner that's the antithesis of the dusty scale hiding beneath your bathroom sink.
To use Naked's body scanner, you climb atop a scale that then rotates in front of a slim, tech-equipped mirror. In a few short minutes, information is sent to your phone through Naked's app that delivers not only precise information on your physical health and its progress over time (metrics including lean mass, fat mass, and body fat percentage are all included), but an animated prototype of your body as well.
Naked Labs
Naked Lab's smartphone-paired technology delivers precise data on your body.
With its product reveal, Naked Labs has closed in on a cash infusion from Founders Fund, NEA, Lumia Capital, Venture 51, and Seabed VC. Founders Fund partner Cyan Banister, who's made early bets on companies like Uber and SpaceX, led Naked Lab' s $14 million round and committed some of her own money to the team, as well.
"That's how bullish I am on this product," Banister told Business Insider. "I invested personally in it. It's a very futuristic product. For people who have never had access to something like this before, it's like magic."
Banister said that she believes that Naked Lab's product has the potential to not only transform the fitness industry, but to inspire a new wave in fitness-oriented social media.
"I believe that people will share these images and data to social," Banister said. "The social behavior behind this will be amazing."
But Naked's technology isn't just relegated to the world of fitness: The applications for Naked Lab's body scanning technology are seemingly limitless, said Sclater.
Naked Labs
Naked Labs co-founder Ed Sclater says that the applications of Naked technology could be used in numerous fields including retail, automation, and medicine.
Already in the works are plans to pair Naked's data with fashion retailers to create an online world where your virtual avatar can shop for outfits fitted precisely to your measurements.
"Our biggest problem is figuring out what not to do," Sclater said. "We have opportunities in the gym space, the medical space, the insurance space where companies are moving from reactive to proactive care. We're interested in working with anyone who wants to customize the world for your body."
This could be anything from bespoke furniture - tables and chairs made exactly with your body's measurements in mind, for instance - to automative technology, which could use the company's data to adjust rearview mirrors and seats to a driver's optimal safety.
For now, Naked's product, with a retail price of $1,395 (along with $100 in shipping) is something of a luxury item. Naked's team says they hope to pare the price down in the future so that it appeals to wider consumer markets, but for now, you might see Naked's scanner popping up at gym or health centers.
"Just about every gym under the sun has contacted us," said Sclater. "We're interested in how a partnership might work - and similarly with doctor offices and other medical institutions. We're definitely exploring the path of making the scanners available to people who can't afford them."