Building in Chattanooga, Startup Electrokare Is Helping Athletes Train Smarter
The startup, which went through Techstars Physical Health Fort Worth in 2024, moved to Chattanooga earlier this year after receiving seed-stage funding from Brickyard VC.
Want more tech stories in your inbox? Sign up for our newsletter to get the latest news from across the Southeast. Subscribe here.
Fitness trackers like Apple Watches, Oura rings, Whoop bands, and heart rate straps, are common these days for everyone from casual gym goers to high-performance athletes.
These wearables do a great job at raising awareness about a person’s general health, says HealthTech entrepreneur Mitchell Leshchiner. But what they aren’t so great at? Giving users deeply accurate and actionable insights on their health, since there are limitations to their PPG (photoplethysmography) based sensors.
That’s where the startup Electrokare, currently building in Chattanooga’s Brickyard, steps in.
The startup, which announced its public beta launch this month, captures blood biomarkers non-invasively to work as a personal performance coach. This allows users to track electrolytes balance, key blood values, hydration, and overall athletic readiness metrics in real time. It also provides in-session feedback to prevent overexertion.
“Cramps, headaches, and performance decline don’t come out of nowhere. They start with a shift in blood chemistry, and we’re giving athletes early warning signals before their body hits a wall,” said Leshchiner. “When you know what’s changing inside your blood in the middle of a workout, you can make smarter decisions to finish stronger. And Electrokare can give you those insights all from an existing heart rate monitor.”
Pairing with standard heart rate straps, Electrokare users turn on the platform during workout sessions or daily activities. They are then presented with live updates, providing optimized performance and recovery recommendations based on individual needs.
Electrokare works on a membership model that is currently priced at $16 per month.
Targeting The Fitness World
Electrokare clearly hit on something that resonates with the fitness crowd. At launch, the startup had over 35,000 people already on their waitlist.
CEO and co-founder Leshchiner (in featured photo) said that he couldn’t necessarily recreate such a winning launch formula, but that shout outs on health-related podcasts were helpful in spreading the word on what they are building. He and the team have also launched their own podcast, Silicon Fox, which has upwards of 70,000 monthly listeners.
In its early days, Electrokare is going after competitive and endurance athletes who are more used to performance and nutrition tracking.
“But I always bring up the edge case. Imagine you are running for the first time. You run a mile away from your house and you cramp, and then you have to stop, you stretch, and you have to walk back.” Such an experience might make a person rethink if they even want to try running again. He sees Electrokare as a solution to prevent that discouragement and keep people on their fitness journey.
The startup, which went through Techstars Physical Health Fort Worth in 2024, moved to Chattanooga earlier this year after receiving seed-stage funding from Brickyard VC.
Leshchiner originally connected to the Brickyard team through a cold LinkedIn direct message. Before moving to Chattanooga, Leshchiner built his career at the intersection of health and technology (and even played professional soccer in France for a time).
“I fundamentally believe health is the most impactful thing in the world. If we get really down to the nitty gritty of it, how can we as humans be happy? Build a career? Make money? It all boils down to: Are we healthy?” he added.
