UAE-based venture capital firm, Mindshift Capital has invested in FORTË, a proprietary solution to digitize fitness offered at gyms and boutique studios. Both technology and subscription-based streaming platform, FORTË installs hardware and software into studios, which enable classes to be streamed live to FORTË ’s platform, currently operating in the US, Canada, and Europe.
Founded by Lauren Fondos, in 2015, FORTË is revolutionizing the fitness industry by providing access to studio classes coached by leading fitness experts worldwide. As a bespoke solution to the industry, previously reliant on either Zoom or Vimeo, the FORTË technology and service is now being used by YMCA, UFC, NFL, Under Armour World Headquarters, Goodlife Fitness (Canada’s largest gym chain), The Edge, Heartcore (from Europe) and many others. FORTË allows brick and mortar gyms to now go online and compete with the likes of Peleton for an ‘on demand’ consumer fitness service.
Prior to 2020, the online fitness market surpassed USD 5 billion and has experienced exponential growth over the past 12 months across all metrics – downloads, availability, and revenue. Central to this growth is the tech enablers such as FORTE’s platform that delivers a turnkey solution for live streaming.
Heather Henyon, Mindshift’s Founding General Partner commented “Mindshift Capital invests in exceptional female-founded companies at the forefront of innovation in their chosen field. We are very excited to add FORTË to our portfolio. Lauren clearly saw the opportunity to lead the evolution in technology in the fitness industry. She was ahead of the curve having invested six years in building this business and has been able to effectively capture the strong demand in the last year – more than 2000 providers reached out with interest in their white-labeled solution. We are proud of Mindshift’s ability to access these investments in such a competitive environment. This investment is more evidence of the high quality of deal flow that we are experiencing as a result of our gender-lens investment focus and exceptional global networks.”.
