Startup Story: how project Kale was created

We continue to acquaint readers with the stories of startup launches within the rubric Startup Story. Today we want to present you Kale project.

About the project

Rim Safiullin is 36 years old.  He is the co-founder and CEO of the startup Kale – this is his job and his favorite thing, in which he puts all his strength.

Rime's professional background is medicine. He worked for an international pharmaceutical company for a long time, and in 2017 he founded a medical clinic, where he became involved in preventive initiatives such as check-ups and telemedicine.

“In 2019, for the first time, I got acquainted with startups, capitalization models and the venture capital market, and, one might say, got sick of it.  Since then I have been in the startup industry.  Now we are developing with the team the best solution in the field of involving a person in the culture of managing their health at an early stage” .

Kale is an application for personal consultations with specialists who help you improve your lifestyle.  A psychologist or health coach can be hired for yourself, and they are often hired by corporations to keep the team productive and prevent employee burnout.

The project team includes 6 people and about 90 more consultants who were involved to work with users (psychologists, healthy lifestyle specialists, preventive doctors and others).

If we talk about the main team, then this is CEO – is engaged in operational management and fundraising, SRO – makes the product, CMO – is performance marketing and positioning, CSO – is in charge of sales, CTO – is engaged in development and CTO AI – performs tasks in the field of artificial intelligence.

About the benefits of the project

According to Rim, the goal of the project is to create a solution that makes managing your health fun at an early stage.

“It so happened that medicine for all of us is something urgent, urgent and not always pleasant.  We try to make it comfortable, "friendly" and interesting at the stage when a person is still healthy, but can already pay attention to increased anxiety, for example, and do something about it.  Therefore, today Kale is the best virtual friend who will highlight the problem in time and push it to be solved with our specialists”.

According to the founder of the project, the startup brings huge benefits, and there are a lot of beneficiaries from Kale.

“A person using our app will experience less burnout.  This means that he does not bring his condition to a chronic form, the employer gets a healthy and productive employee, and the state gets an efficient economy”.

How do you want to develop your project further?

As Rim admits, their key goal for 2022 is the markets of the countries of Central Asia: first of all, these are the markets of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, and then the countries of the Asia Pacific and MENA regions.

“Our team has been moving towards this for a long time.  Now we are in the stage of active fundraising and raise money to accelerate our growth.  Expansion of business outside the country is, of course, an important stage in the development of a startup.  This will attract more attention, therefore, increase brand awareness.  In general, international growth increases the prestige of the company, and it is also an opportunity to attract foreign investment” .

What was the most difficult part of working on the project?

According to Rim, the most difficult stage in the work on a startup can be called the first “valley of death” of a startup, which occurs long before entering a positive economy.

 “Death Valley is a period in a startup, its most difficult stage, when all costs, investments and other expenses have been made, the project has been launched, but there is no profit yet, and it’s too late to abandon it, because enough time, resources and money have been invested.  The valley of death is associated with the first disappointments in the chosen business model, the first transformation into the culture of pivots (changing the concept of a startup) and the search for what people need”.

As the hero notes, almost every project has to go through this difficult period, but if you survive the first crisis, then it will be easier.

 “For novice startups, I would like to communicate more with potential clients.  This is the most important thing at work.  The main thing is not to be afraid to try and take risks”.