[GVP] India’s $160B Heart Crisis. A $60 AI Lifeline From ex-Goldman Sachs.
Preventive heart care affordable for millions.
You Don’t Even Know You’re At a Risk
In 2021, Sourav Ganguly, our indian Captain, our fitness icon, a man with the best doctors, dieticians, and medical facilities at his disposal, collapsed with chest pain and rushed to the hospital.
He was just 48.
He had everything, best medication, best diet and experts to guide him.
And yet, a heart attack nearly ended his life.
If Ganguli wasn’t safe, what about the billions of ordinary Indians?
1 in 4 deaths in India are caused by cardiovascular disease.
India suffer heart attacks 10 years earlier than the global average.
45% of middle-aged deaths in India are heart-related
The scariest part? Over 30% of hypertensive Indians don’t even know they’re at risk.
You Don’t Even Know You’re At a Risk
Like Ganguli, nobody knew that he was having a heart attack, until he got it.
We’re living in this age of AI. Why can’t AI predict before when you’ve a heart attack.
This is the problem that Helius wants to solve.
Meet Helius Wellness: India’s heart guardian.
It’s India’s first AI-driven heart health platform designed to protect every Indian heart — whether you’re a sportsman or a school teacher.
Most health devices today, Apple Watch, Fitbit, even hospital BP monitors are designed for snapshots.
They only measure your vitals at one moment in time, like taking a single photograph.
But heart disease in India doesn’t strike in snapshots.
It builds silently, day by day, in families who rarely check vitals until it’s too late.
A Helius wristband continuously tracks blood pressure.
The app calculates your heart risk in 90 seconds.
AI-powered insights give you personalized recommendations.
And the best part?
It can even connect with insurers to reward healthy habits.
This is how it works:
The Helius wristband will send a tiny light (PPG - light sensors) on your skin to track how blood flows through your veins (PPG) and also listens to the heart’s electrical signals (ECG). Together, these signals tell the AI how your blood pressure and heart rhythms are changing in real time. Instead of waiting for a hospital check-up, the app gives you a quick heart risk score in 90 seconds. It’s like having a pocket doctor that quietly watches over your heart all day.
Market Analysis:
India is the epicenter of world’s heart disease capital:
220 million people with hypertension, 120 million with pre-diabetes, and 77 million with diabetes.
Indians get heart attacks almost a decade earlier than the global average.
And by 2050, cardiovascular deaths are expected to rise by 91%.
That’s not a future problem.
That’s a ticking bomb inside households right now
At the same time, wearables have gone from “urban toy” to mainstream adoption.
Ten years ago, only the elite in Bangalore and Delhi strapped on Fitbits. Today, teenagers in Tier 2 cities are tracking their steps, and middle-aged professionals are gifting smartwatches to their parents. The Indian wearable market is already $1 billion and set to quadruple by 2028.
And Helius Wellness is building at the intersection of 3 booming waves:
Preventive care adoption ($160B market)
Affordable wearables designed for India ($1B → $4B)
AI-driven digital health ($37B)
If they succeed in India, the world’s toughest, most complex heart market. They can create a playbook for every emerging market (Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia) and even developed ones like the US/UK where insurers are desperate to cut cardiac costs.
Why Apple and Fit bit is not a competition for them?
Apple Watch and Fitbit were never designed for India. They’re expensive, calibrated on Western data, and only scratch the surface of preventive care. What India needs isn’t another gadget. It needs a system — something affordable, accessible, and tuned to the unique risk profile of Indian hearts.
The timing couldn’t be better. Insurers are finally incentivizing prevention because it saves them payouts. Government schemes like ABHA are forcing healthcare digitization. Families are spending more on health than ever before — not because they want to, but because lifestyle disease has become the biggest fear across the middle class.
If the last decade was about step counters and calorie trackers, the next decade will be about real
preventive healthcare.
The Team Behind Helius Wellness
Helius Wellness isn’t just built by engineers. It’s built by people who understand medicine, finance, and healthcare at scale.
Paresh Masani (Founder & CEO): Former Goldman Sachs leader and Head of Engineering at UK healthtech unicorn Huma. He scaled Huma from a small team to 200+ engineers and worked with pharma giants like Pfizer and Bayer. After losing his father-in-law to heart disease, this mission became deeply personal.
Dr. Jignesh Makwana (Head of Medical Devices): PhD from IIT Roorkee, with 20+ years building medical devices and solving real-world healthcare challenges.
Kaushik Gune (Growth & Strategy Lead): Has already scaled three healthcare ventures to $100M+ revenue. Previously led Huma’s US operations.
Sandeep Pandey (VP Finance & Strategy): 24 years in India’s top banks, managed portfolios worth over ₹1,250 Cr, and brings financial discipline to Helius Wellness.
And they’re not working alone. Helius Wellness has partnerships with universities and hospitals like Swaminarayan University’s Medical College, making sure the product is tested, trusted, and ready to reach millions of Indians.
This isn’t just a startup team. It’s doctors, engineers, and healthcare leaders working together to protect Indian hearts.
How They Make Money? (Business Model)
Most health startups pick one lane - they sell a gadget, or they build an app. Helius Wellness is different. It’s building a full ecosystem where every part reinforces the other.
It starts with the wristband, an affordable hardware that brings users in. From there, families upgrade to subscriptions for AI health reports, remote consults, and multi-user plans.
Please see the Pro-Zone to to check their business model and unit economy.
GVP’s Take
Every few decades, a shift happens in healthcare that changes how billions live.
In the 1990s, it was diabetes monitoring what once needed a hospital machine turned into a tiny glucometer at home. Suddenly, anyone could check their sugar in seconds
Today, we’re standing at the same inflection point for heart health.
At GVP, we’ve seen dozens of healthtech pitches. Most are apps that track steps or gadgets that look good on a wrist. Helius Wellness is different.
It’s tackling India’s biggest health crisis — the fact that one in four deaths is heart-related — with a system that actually fits India: affordable hardware, AI trained on Indian data, and partnerships that bridge patients, hospitals, and insurers.
Their Moat comes from the Helius Neural Network — AI models built on Indian health data that create personalized heart health trajectories. Unlike static risk calculators used in pharma trials,
Helius’ models learn continuously. The endgame? Early prediction of heart attacks. Even if they only get halfway there, the impact would be transformative.
The founder, Paresh Masani, has already scaled a healthtech unicorn in the UK. Now he’s bringing that expertise home, with a personal drive rooted in family loss. That mix of credibility and conviction is rare.
If Helius Wellness succeeds, it won’t just be another wearable company. It will be the platform that prevented 1.5 lakh premature deaths by 2030. And that’s the kind of mission-driven business that can create both impact and outsized returns.
PS: Sourav Ganguly survived his heart attack because emergency care was nearby. Millions of Indians won’t get that lucky. Helius Wellness is trying to change that story.
Unit economy, traction records & full pitch deck download(Pro Zone)