MuscleSound, a rapidly growing startup leveraging glycogen testing to detect and prevent soft-tissue muscle injuries across a variety of industries, today announced it has secured $4.3 million in seed funding from multiple angel investors.
Utilizing non-invasive ultrasound, MuscleSound has developed a patented SaaS platform to instantly measure and analyze glycogen content levels. Glycogen is the primary energy source used during periods of high-intensity exertion. For example, an athlete or team trainer simply scans a muscle and sends an ultrasound image to MuscleSound’s cloud-based software for glycogen-content results in approximately 15 seconds.
MuscleSound is focusing its initial efforts in the professional and amateur sports markets, providing real-time data analysis of a player’s nutritional and recovery needs and offering recommendations to replenish glycogen levels, ensuring peak athletic performance. The company is quickly expanding into medicine and animal health markets where it expects substantial growth.
The investment validates MuscleSound as an emerging leader in identifying and preventing soft-tissue muscle injuries and implementing recovery strategies for world-class athletes. The training staffs of teams worldwide currently leverage MuscleSound, including the Colorado Rockies, Dallas Mavericks, the University of Colorado and Oregon State University, as well as global Olympic teams and soccer clubs in the United Kingdom.
“MuscleSound has a unique opportunity to lead the way toward preventing muscle injuries for athletes around the world by providing an immediate picture into their glycogen content status and needs,” said MuscleSound CEO Stephen Kurtz. “MuscleSound is the missing link in optimal athletic performance.”
Prior to MuscleSound, the only way to measure an athlete’s glycogen levels was through a muscle biopsy, a time intensive, aggressive, and invasive procedure. Kurtz believes that with MuscleSound’s application, the nearly 1,000 games NFL players lost due to soft tissue injuries during the 2014 regular season (which cost teams approximately $97 million in player salaries) could be largely avoided.
“It’s significantly more expensive to lose a player to injury and wait for recovery than it is to practice good prevention—just look at the NFL’s lost salary figures already this season due to injuries,” Kurtz said. “MuscleSound turns this on its head by helping teams determine how they need to be strategic about preventing injuries. Without MuscleSound, this information would be unavailable.”