Health and wellness startup Aaptiv raises $22 million in Series C funding; Amazon Alexa Fund and Warner Music Group among new investors

Health and wellness startup Aaptiv has raised $22 million in Series C funding to further the company’s technology innovation, product growth, and customer acquisition.  The round was led by Millennium Technology Value Partners, a growth equity firm that has previously invested in Spotify, Facebook, Alibaba, among others. Joining them is 14W, a venture capital firm with a portfolio that includes Wallapop, Glossier, Lyst, and Goop. Existing investor Insight Venture Partners also participated in the financing, bringing Insight’s total investment in Aaptiv to over $30 million. This investment is Aaptiv’s largest round to date and funding will be used to further the company’s technology innovation, product growth, and customer acquisition. This latest financing round brings the total funding to date to over $52 million.

Founded in 2015 by founder and CEO Ethan Agarwal, the New York City-based Aaptiv is a provider of premium digital health and wellness content with a fast-growing community of more than 200,000 members taking 30,000 of Aaptiv’s exclusive classes each day. Aaptiv has over 80 employees in its New York office and has raised $30m from leading venture capital firms.

With a mission to empower everyone to live a healthier life, Aaptiv has transformed the way people exercise and train through its innovative use of sound. Every Aaptiv class combines the guiding voice of an expert Aaptiv trainer with motivating music by top artists in every genre. This audio-based format eliminates distractions, allowing members to focus on their fitness goals, when and where it suits them.

Aaptiv members have unlimited, on-demand access to over 2,500 audio-guided classes across every type of exercise and a wide variety of activities, including running, strength-training, yoga, indoor cycling, meditation, and more. Aaptiv constantly provides members with fresh new content, adding 40 new classes every week. Each class is created by one of Aaptiv’s 20 certified trainers who focus on goal attainment, encouragement, and positive reinforcement – emphasizing the importance of both mind and body strength in living a healthy life.

Aaptiv is a leading provider of premium digital health and wellness content that has garnered nearly 200,000 paying members in two years. Its audio-guided fitness classes have been streamed more than 14 million times.

Strategic investors include the Amazon Alexa Fund, Disney, Warner Music Group, and NWS Holdings. Aaptiv will be joining the Disney Accelerator this summer.

“We are honored to be supported by the world’s leading investment firms and technology companies,” said Ethan Agarwal, founder and CEO of Aaptiv. “Aaptiv is now uniquely positioned to continue its dominance in the rapidly growing digital wellness content market. This capital – along with the support from our strategic investors – will allow us to continue to improve the world class product experience we build for our hundreds of thousands of members.”

“We are most excited by how fast Aaptiv has established itself as a category leader in the wellness and fitness space,” said Ray Cheng, Partner at Millennium. “The company’s growth and user engagement metrics over the past two years are some of the best we have seen and we believe a large opportunity awaits as Aaptiv continues deliver the best in class workout experience.”

“Aaptiv is at the helm of shaping the future of fitness and reinventing how people work out,” said Alex Zubillaga, Managing Partner of 14W. “We are proud to invest in a company that has created the fastest-growing mobile fitness product on the market and is changing the way people think about how to live a healthier life.”

“As evidenced by their strong growth, Aaptiv is running toward becoming the next big name in the fitness tech market, due substantially to a rather advanced technology strategy and approach to growth,” said Harley Miller, Vice President, Insight Venture Partners. “We are thrilled to further our investment in Aaptiv and look forward to working together to continue scaling their innovative product.”

“Connected fitness is emerging as a compelling new domain for consumers,” said Paul Bernard, director of Amazon’s Alexa Fund. “We’re excited about Aaptiv’s voice-first approach to personal training, and look forward to helping them explore innovative ways to bring that experience to Alexa.”