Startup Mantra: Track your overall health with Breath AI

Sanjay Phadke was on a flight back from his trip to the USA a year and a half ago, at 40,000 feet, when he suddenly woke up from his mid-flight sleep to witness a heavy chest and uneasiness. Perplexed, he rushed to his smartwatch to check his heartbeats and checked an ECG only to find some abnormal findings. Desperate to find a way out and in reacting to the situation, he applied his Yoga experience of exhaling slowly to reduce breathlessness and with determined attempts to breathe slowly, he gradually gained control over his heart rate. After doing it over and again for an hour or so, he found the second ECG appeared normal.

This mid-air health crisis put Phadke to go to the core of the problem to find that to overcome crises like the ones he faced or to pre-empt such situations for a healthy life, one must have a ready template of knowing and decoding the ‘breath,’ which is the sole reason of one’s existence and decides the condition of heart, mind, and a body as a whole.

This pursuit of reaching an inclusive solution for a healthy and happy life by integrating the deep science and technology centred around ‘breath’ gave rise to a tech platform Phadke and his team established called ‘Breath AI.’

“Breath AI’s wrist wearable is equipped with an array of sensors, including temperature sensors, photoplethysmography, an accelerometer, a gyroscope, and bio-impedance sensors. These sensors work together to measure breath composition, heart rate variability (HRV), and other essential biomarkers, providing a comprehensive picture of an individual’s health status,” says Phadke, founder of deep sci-tech company Virtual Sense Global Technologies which has launched Breath AI.

Banker-turned-technologist

Phadke completed his mechanical engineering in 1994. He professed as a banker for many years and turned a technologist, integrator, and researcher on humanities. He landed in Pune in 2016 and worked with Vayana Network, a fintech startup in supply chain financing.

“After incorporating Virtual Sense Global Technologies, we initially worked on different ideas including one of creating an ‘Alexa’ of fragrances and making a breath analyser for diabetes. We debuted with this at the Consumer Electronics Show in 2020, but then Covid-19 struck. Because of Covid-19, we could not continue working on breathing as a medium, but we realised that it is important to understand the “human body as a machine” continuously. This made us switch essentially towards a wearable and we worked on this idea for the next three years,” said Phadke.

Preventive health

Preventive health space and wearable devices for health monitoring space is exploding. The miniaturisation of wearables will bring clinics or hospitals to our fingertips with sensor-based clinical precision reports available on a continuous basis.

The current wearable market size in India is ₹58,000 crore and is expected to double by 2028. It is estimated that there will be 23 per cent increase in the population with mental health issues in India, which will make mental health services inaccessible and more expensive. There is only one psychiatrist per 4 lakh population in India. At present, the cost per counselling session is anywhere between ₹800 to ₹6,500 as the availability of counsellors is a concern.

“By analysing and providing personalised breath-work approaches, Breath AI can help users tackle a whole host of acute issues of health and tap into their hidden potential. Further, its recommendation engine will suggest exactly what the user’s body needs. Breath AI has employed a team of designers and technologists and experts from fields like yoga, meditation, and expressive arts to provide solutions to work on the niche areas for more mindful living,” adds Phadke.

Breath and HRV

“We considered two components of the human body as a machine – breath and HRV. To measure these two components, we need precise statistics with newer sensors (hardware) that understand more about health. Once we have enough data, then the data science analytics and dials to change the trajectory from a stressed state to a calm state. The easiest of the dials to start with is breath,” explains Phadke.

“While HRV is a bridge between body and mind, or the state of balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system, which also acts as the marker for the state of the bridge. So, if we take HRV-based measurements as the indicator, then breath becomes the dial to ‘tune’ the state to a better mode. There is an intricate relationship between the cardiovascular system and the respiratory system. These systems coexist and influence each other. If we start breathing slower, then automatically the system will reset,” he said.

Wearables and sensors

Says Phadke, “Most wearables today talk about understanding the physiology or the body in terms of step count or heart rate etc. There is no way to measure mental or emotional health. This is what took us back to our roots in Ayurveda where we talk about health being a state of balance.

“The idea of Breath AI band or wearable is a pioneering, non-invasive technology that will help the user to track stress, sleep, and the complete BMW (Body, Mind, and Wellness) for total happiness. It’s effortless sensing, based on the user’s unique bio-data, the recommendation engine suggests activities and interventions that help to reach the health-related goals,” Phadke stated.

Explaining the expected outcomes from Breath AI variables, Sanjay said, “In the first version of the mobile app, our sophisticated recommendation system detects stress and recommends courses related to breathing techniques to users. In the advanced versions, we will have breath sensors into which the users can breathe into. The exhaled breath analysis will let the user know about the condition of his heart and brain.”

Partnerships

“Breath AI has partnered with Kaivalyadhama, a Yoga Institute in Lonavla for the research and trials. Within India, we have tied up with IISER and IIT Bombay. Outside India, we are in discussion with Harvard Medical School in the United States and Monash University in Australia, informed Phadke. We have also partnered with Shopify for distribution of the Breath Band, while for manufacturing the critical electronic components, Breath AI has tied up with India’s largest PCB manufacturer Shogini Technoarts,” Phadke said.

Expansion plans

Sharing his plans, Phadke said, “At present, we have a team of 20 members. We are now approaching the Australian regulatory authorities, to tap the Australian market. We will also look at other markets like Japan, Europe, and the US. On the services front, we would be offering a lot more services to third-party coaches in the form of subscription services. The idea is to offer a full health monitoring and improvement system.”