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Kayla Itsines’ Adelaide fitness app Sweat sells for $400 million

Starting in her parent’s backyard in 2015, fitness guru Kayla Itsines and business partner Tobi Pearce have sold their Sweat empire to US software company iFIT.

Image: Kayla Itsines Instagram.

Fitness app Sweat was founded by Kayla Itsines and Tobi Pearce in 2015, and has gone from humble beginnings to one of Adelaide’s biggest success stories, making headlines this week by selling to US software company iFIT for $400 million. 

The Sweat app is used by an audience of women all over the world, providing tailor-made fitness programs, workouts, recipes and community forums. Six years since starting the app, Adelaide born and raised Kayla Itsines, who is the face of the brand, and business partner Tobi Pearce, have sold the fitness brand for a staggering sum.

Both Pearce and Itsines have been established names present on the AFR’s Young Rich List every year since 2018, with the sale only furthering the incredible fortune amassed from the success of the app.

With a group of 13 motivational trainers specialising in pilates, barre, strength and conditioning, yoga and HIIT workouts, Sweat has been incredibly successful in connecting women with the fitness journey that best suits them, as well as proving support from community forums within the apps where women can make connections with others on their own fitness journeys. 

Sweat started out from humble beginnings in 2015 as Kayla’s ‘Bikini Body Guides’ e-books, which underwent a name change earlier this year to be more in keeping with contemporary positive language promoting an increase in fitness over weight-loss. The guides are now called High Intensity with Kayla and include a post-pregnancy program inspired by Kayla’s own pregnancy with daughter Arna. 

Inspired by her work as a personal trainer, initially training clients from her parent’s backyard, Kayla is now one of the fitness industries biggest names, coaching a global audience of over 50 million women, with the app’s largest audiences in the US, UK and Australia. 

In an Instagram post discussing the acquisition, Itsines heralded the sale as a “new chapter for Sweat” which will continue to remain a stand alone brand after the transition into the iFIT company. Itsines’ assured her followers the acquisition would not change the Sweat brand they have come to know and love but will enable the Sweat team to provide “new world class fitness content”, expanding the Sweat Community even further.  

With an incredible global reach across 155 countries, the brand is one of Adelaide and South Australia’s most successful names, and will continue to operate from its Parkside headquarters after the acquisition. 

iFIT, the US fitness organisation that has acquired Sweat, will add the company to its roster of brands which include Nordic Track, Proform and Freemotion Fitness. 

Read more about Sweat on their website here. 

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