Cure.fit did not fail because the market rejected fitness. It nearly failed because it could not decide what it was. Gym, food delivery, meditation app, diagnostics clinic, all at once. Four businesses wearing one logo. The recovery only started when the company stopped trying to be everything and became one thing: Cult.
That is the whole story in a line. Cure.fit pivoted so many times it forgot its own definition. The losses followed the confusion. And the turnaround, such as it is, came from subtraction, not addition.
Cure.fit net loss: the sprawl, then the focus
Consolidated net loss, Rs crore
Losses widened across the four-vertical years, then narrowed after the refocus. Sources: Inc42 (FY24), Entrackr (FY25).
What exactly is Cure.fit, and what did it try to be?
Cure.fit launched in 2016 in Bengaluru. The founders were Mukesh Bansal, who had already built and sold Myntra, and Ankit Nagori, a former Flipkart executive. Serious pedigree. Serious money behind them.
The pitch was a “holistic wellness” platform. In practice that meant four separate businesses under one roof. Cult.fit ran the gyms and fitness classes. Eat.fit ran healthy-food cloud kitchens. Mind.fit sold meditation, yoga and mental wellness. Care.fit ran healthcare, doctors and diagnostics.
On a pitch deck, this looks visionary. One app for your whole health. Work out, eat clean, calm your mind, see a doctor. A wellness empire.
In the real world, it meant one company fighting on four fronts at the same time. Each front had its own competitors, its own economics, its own way of losing money. That is not a moat. That is four leaks in one boat.
Revenue grew by a third in FY24. The loss still ballooned 42% to Rs 888.5 crore. That is what burning across four fronts looks like.
Why did doing everything become the problem?
Here is the thing about a brand. People need to be able to describe it in one line. Ask someone what Zomato is. Food delivery. Ask what Cred is. A rewards app for paying credit-card bills. One line, one job.
Now ask what Cure.fit was. You cannot answer cleanly. Was it a gym? A food company? A health app? A clinic? It was all of them, which means it was none of them in the mind of the customer.
Each vertical demanded a different kind of business. Gyms are real estate and trainers and rent. Cloud kitchens are food safety, delivery riders and wafer-thin margins. Diagnostics is a regulated healthcare business. Meditation is a content and app play. These do not share a playbook. They barely share a customer.
So the company spread its money, its management attention and its marketing across four things that each needed full focus. Spreading yourself thin is not a strategy. It is the absence of one.
We have seen this exact movie before. Micromax owned a clear, price-led smartphone moment, then blurred into too many things and lost its identity. We broke that down in our piece on the Micromax failure and identity crisis. Lose the one-line answer, lose the brand.
How much money did the sprawl actually burn?
A lot. Investors kept the tank full for years. Cure.fit raised more than $700 million across its life from Zomato, Tata Digital, Temasek, Kalaari Capital and South Park Commons, among others, as reported by Entrackr. That funding pushed its post-money valuation to about Rs 13,668 crore, roughly $1.45 billion, per the same report. A unicorn, on paper.
The losses matched the ambition. In FY24, parent CureFit’s consolidated net loss widened 42% to Rs 888.5 crore, up from Rs 625.5 crore the year before, even as operating revenue grew 33.6% to Rs 926.6 crore, as reported by Inc42. Read that twice. Revenue went up by a third, and losses still ballooned. That is what burning across too many fronts looks like.
It was not the first warning. When Covid hit in 2020 and the gyms shut, the cash math broke fast. The company laid off around 800 employees in May 2020, followed by roughly 600 more, and closed centres across about 15 smaller cities including Mysuru, Surat, Ahmedabad and Indore, as reported by Inc42. A focused business can survive a shock. A business stretched across four verticals has four places to bleed.
When did Cure.fit admit the mistake?
It admitted it in the most honest way a company can. It changed its own name.
The parent rebranded from Curefit to Cult.fit, because the gym brand, Cult, had the real recall. People knew Cult. They went to Cult classes. They wore Cult gear. Nobody was building their identity around Care.fit diagnostics.
That rename is the entire lesson in one move. The company looked at its four children and picked the one that actually had a brand. The “holistic wellness platform” quietly became a fitness company that also sells other stuff.
The acquisitions tell the same story. Cult.fit bought the India business of Gold’s Gym in February 2022, as reported by Inc42. It also picked up connected-fitness and equipment brands like Tread, RPM Fitness and Fitkit. Notice the pattern. The money started flowing toward fitness and away from the scatter. The company was finally betting on the one thing it was known for.
Is Cult.fit’s comeback actually working?
Slowly, yes, and that is the part the early sprawl makes more impressive. Focus is doing what diversification could not.
In FY25, Cult.fit’s operating revenue grew 31.2% to Rs 1,215.5 crore, while its net loss narrowed 10% to Rs 480.8 crore, as reported by Entrackr. For the first time in a while, the losses are shrinking while revenue climbs. The same report notes that fitness subscriptions, the Cult core, made up about 73% of revenue. The business is finally earning most of its money from the thing it is actually known for.
The company is now reportedly preparing an IPO to raise around Rs 2,500 crore at a valuation near $2 billion, per Entrackr. Whether the public market agrees with that price is a separate fight. But a company that nearly bled out across four businesses is now a focused fitness player with narrowing losses and a clean story to sell. That is real progress.
It is not a finished comeback. The business still loses hundreds of crores a year. Profitability is a promise, not a fact. But the direction changed the moment the focus changed.
The Turn
FY25 is the first year revenue climbed while the loss shrank, to Rs 480.8 crore, with fitness subscriptions now about 73% of revenue. Focus is doing what diversification could not.
What is the real lesson for founders here?
Doing more is not the same as building more. For years Cure.fit confused activity with strategy. Four verticals felt like ambition. It was actually dilution.
The contrast is brutal when you put it next to a disciplined brand. Zerodha built India’s biggest stockbroker by doing one thing extremely well and refusing to chase everything else, which we covered in how Zerodha won on almost zero ad spend. One sharp business beat one sprawling one. It usually does.
And when sprawl meets cheap money, the damage hides for years. Byju’s is the loudest example, an over-funded company that kept expanding into everything until the math caught up, as we broke down in the Byju’s failure and edtech collapse. Funding lets you postpone the focus question. It does not cancel it.
So the takeaway is simple. Pick the one thing your customer can name you for. Be excellent at it. Earn the right to expand later, from strength, not from a pitch deck. Cure.fit learned this the expensive way. It only started to recover when it stopped being everything and went back to being Cult.
FAQ
What is Cure.fit and is it the same as Cult.fit?
Cure.fit was a Bengaluru wellness company founded in 2016 by Mukesh Bansal and Ankit Nagori. It ran four businesses: Cult.fit (fitness), Eat.fit (food), Mind.fit (mental wellness) and Care.fit (healthcare). The parent later rebranded to Cult.fit, because the gym brand had the strongest recall, so today Cure.fit and Cult.fit refer to the same group.
Why did Cure.fit struggle?
It tried to run four very different businesses at once, each with its own economics and competitors. That spread money and attention thin and led to heavy losses. In FY24 the parent’s net loss widened 42% to Rs 888.5 crore even as revenue grew, as reported by Inc42.
Is Cult.fit profitable now?
Not yet. But it is improving. In FY25 revenue grew 31.2% to Rs 1,215.5 crore and net loss narrowed 10% to Rs 480.8 crore, as reported by Entrackr. The losses are shrinking, which is progress, but the company is still loss-making.
Is Cult.fit going public?
Cult.fit is reportedly preparing an IPO to raise around Rs 2,500 crore at a valuation near $2 billion, as reported by Entrackr. The timeline and final pricing are not confirmed.
What is the main lesson from the Cure.fit story?
Focus beats sprawl. A brand needs a one-line answer to “what is this?” Cure.fit lost that by being everything at once. Its turnaround began when it narrowed back to fitness under the Cult brand.
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Sources: FY24 loss: Inc42. FY25 results, funding and valuation: Entrackr. Gold’s Gym acquisition: Business Standard.
By Amisha, The Brand Crush. This piece is independent analysis and opinion. It uses publicly reported figures and the company’s own actions as fair comment, and does not assert any wrongdoing.
