• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Skip to navigation
Close Ad

The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

  • Home
  • Podcasts
  • Events
  • Newsletter
  • Connect
    • Custom Events
    • Slack
    • RSS
    • Send us a Tip
  • Advertise
  • Consulting
  • About
The Spoon
  • Home
  • Podcasts
  • Newsletter
  • Events
  • Advertise
  • About

Keyto Raises $2.5M, Launches Crowdfunding Campaign for Ketogenic Diet Device

by Chris Albrecht
November 27, 2018November 27, 2018Filed under:
  • Foodtech
  • Funding
  • Personalized Food
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)

Keyto, a startup that helps people adhere to a ketogenic diet, today announced that it has raised a $2.5 million seed round of funding and launched an Indiegogo campaign for its Keyto breath analyzer and accompanying app.

The ketogenic, or “keto” diet, is a low-carb, high-fat diet and all the rage right now. Here’s how Harvard Health Publishing describes how the diet works:

In essence, it is a diet that causes the body to release ketones into the bloodstream. Most cells prefer to use blood sugar, which comes from carbohydrates, as the body’s main source of energy. In the absence of circulating blood sugar from food, we start breaking down stored fat into molecules called ketone bodies (the process is called ketosis). Once you reach ketosis, most cells will use ketone bodies to generate energy until we start eating carbohydrates again.

One of the ketones the body produces when on this diet is acetone, which is released via your breath. The Keyto analyzer measures the amount of acetone you exhale and communicates that level to the Keyto app. The app then reports back on what your ketosis level is on a scale of one to ten (the higher the level, the more efficient your fat burning). Based on your current and goal weights, the Keyto app then provides food and meal recommendations for you, as well as a community of other Keyto users to share information with and a color coded guide of over 10,000 items to eat while on the diet.

Keto adherents can pick up a Keyto system for $99 on Indiegogo right now. After the crowdfunding campaign, Keyto will retail for $150. In an interview, Keyto Co-Founder Dr. Ray Wu told me that the Keyto device is already in the production process and will ship to backers in January of 2019.

I asked Wu why, if the company is already in production and has raised a seed round, is it turning to crowdfunding? “One of the biggest reasons is business intelligence,” said Dr. Wu, “We’re trying to gauge how many units we should be producing, and we want to get people excited about the product.”

We are not dieticians or scientists here at The Spoon, so we can’t recommend (or condemn) the keto diet, nor validate the effectiveness of the Keyto product. However, Keyto isn’t the only company looking to pick up on what you exhale. This past July, Lumen launched an Indiegogo campaign for their own eponymous device which claimed to measure the CO2 in your breath to see if you are burning carbs or body fat.

FWIW, that Lumen campaign went on to raise more than $1.8 million dollars. Will Keyto be able to ride the keto craze and muscle up more money than that?


Related

Blow it Out: How the Keyto Device Gamified Me Into the Keto Diet

Listen, this post is going to make me seem like the world's biggest hypocrite. After writing about gradually turning vegan last week, I'm doing a full 180 to write about how I spent this past week piling up meat and heavy cream to go on a keto diet. In my…

KetoCoach is a Home Blood Test Kit for Keto Dieters

I was legitimately nervous about the needle. I realize this makes me a big baby, especially since it's not even a real needle — it's the teen-tiny pointy tip of a lancet cartridge. But like a four-year old, I asked KetoCoach Founder, Matt Payne, if his companies ketone blood test…

Lumen Raises $8.5M, Says it Has Sold 11,000 Breathalyzers for Metabolic Hacking

Lumen, which gives you personalized diet recommendation based on your breath, announced today that it has raised $8.5 million in funding. The news was first reported by CTech, which writes that the new money was led by Hong Kong-listed H&H company and Unorthodox Ventures, with Disruptive Venture Capital and Gigi…

Get the Spoon in your inbox

Just enter your email and we’ll take care of the rest:

Find us on some of these other platforms:

  • Apple Podcasts
  • Spotify
Tagged:
  • keto
  • keto diet
  • Keyto

Post navigation

Previous Post Keatz Combines Frozen Food with Satellite Kitchens for Restaurant Delivery
Next Post Cafe in Japan Uses Robots to Create Jobs for People with Disabilities

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Get The Spoon in Your Inbox

The Spoon Podcast Network!

Feed your mind! Subscribe to one of our podcasts!

Thermomix Has Long Been a Leader in Cooking Automation, But Now They’re Going Full Robot
Is IFT’s Launch of an AI Tool For Food Scientists an Indicator of Where Trade Associations Are Going in Age of AI?
From Red Bull to Zevia, Amy Taylor Shares Lessons Learned From a Career Built Around Buzzy Beverages
Study: AI-Powered Drones Fuel Advances in Precision Ag for Early Detection of Crop Stress
Could Lasers Made From Olive Oil Be The Next-Gen Freshness Detector or Use-By Label?

Footer

  • About
  • Sponsor the Spoon
  • The Spoon Events
  • Spoon Plus

© 2016–2025 The Spoon. All rights reserved.

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.