DSM, Huami extend personalised nutrition partnership

Technology continues to accelerate the move into more personalised approaches to nutrition and health, with announcement of a partnership between Royal DSM and Huami Corp. the latest to showcase the potential. Technologies from Huami, a smart wearables company, will potentially serve as a key data source for personalised nutrition concepts focusing on important health issues such as pre-diabetes, cardiac health and sports performance.

The initial concept will combine Huami’s Amazfit® wearable technologies and PAI® (personal activity intelligence) score with DSM’s AVA® digital platform to measure and track health data in real time. Ultimately, consumers would have the ability to gather information that would be analysed in relation to a desired health goal, supporting their ability to make informed health choices.

According to Hugh Welsh, president and general counsel, DSM North America, the scope of the partnership is ultimately global, with initial pilots taking place in select markets, including North America, the UK and parts of Asia-Pacific. In addition, there are already several commercial pilots ongoing with AVA in the weight management, pre-diabetes and immune health spaces; the partnership with Huami should enrich those programmes.

“Personalized nutrition and physical activity both play a significant role in helping individuals prevent and manage chronic lifestyle health conditions,” said Mike Yeung, chief operating officer of Huami. “DSM’s vast experience in this space combined with the content-rich AVA digital platform will enable us to build additional value-added solutions to further our mission of connecting health with technology.”

Welsh added that the platform can be configured to gather different types of data, depending on the use case and outcome. He explained: “It can include a wide variety of health and wellness markers such as heart rate, sleep patterns, stress indicators, exercise and activity, nutritional markers such as micronutrient levels, as well as ‘biological’ markers such as DNA or microbiome. The gathered information is analysed in relation to the desired health and wellness goal and improvement areas or gaps are identified against that goal. The platform then makes appropriate recommendations such as dietary habits, supplementation options, exercise, sleep and others.”

DSM and Huami have also taken steps to ensure the platform offers consumers expected levels of data privacy, while hoping to gain some aggregate insights over the long term. “We treat the topic of privacy very seriously and comply at all times with the applicable regulations,” Welsh stated. “Within those boundaries there remain a lot of learning opportunities for example through a better understanding what types of recommendations are showing the best outcomes at the individual’s level.”