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A former world champion bodybuilder builds healthy water business, choosing Taiwan as launchpad
A new player has entered the beverage market with a unique twist on healthy hydration. Meet Aquivio, a startup founded by Daniel Hill, a former bodybuilder who won an international bodybuilding competition - IFBB Junior World Champion. With a mission to make hydrogen water accessible to the masses, Daniel Hill with Taiwanese co-founder Mark Chang rented out their water dispensers to gyms and companies, which provide hydrogen water in a healthy, affordable, and eco-friendly way.
Daniel Hill, who started his bodybuilder career at the age of 18, won the IFBB Junior World Champion title in 2007. He gained fame as a professional bodybuilder over the globe, who got featured in magazines and even had a Facebook fan page of his own.
“One principle to work in the fitness industry is that you fully understand your body,” said Hill, who studied pharmacy at Goethe University Frankfurt. Looking into the nutrient space, Hill was determined to perform better at the professional level. He not only focused on all the supplements for diets, but also took consideration into hydration, as water is the ultimate carrier of all substances, according to Hill.
In 2007, he had his first experience with water treatment, which involves using a water ionizer to produce hydrogen water for daily consumption. He bought the electronic ionizer and drink hydrogen water every day. As an athlete, he was fascinated by the effects of antioxidant water, which helps with detox, immune support, and overall health.
Since then, Hill had been engaging in this dispenser distribution and sales as his side business. He imported the costly machines from Taiwan and sold them to Germany. Back then, a machine cost from USD$2,000 to USD$4,000. It would be a luxury to own one at home. As a bodybuilder influencer, Hill mostly targeted people also in the fitness industry as customers. But at the same time, he felt restricted not being able to make it affordable for all.
After a six-year course of selling and retailing, Hill decided to end his bodybuilder career and dived into the hydrogen water business full-time.
To seek the best manufacturers, Daniel Hill chooses Taiwan as the launch pad
“I want to build a water dispenser to provide users with exactly what they need,” said Hill, “to make it scalable, we need economic components.” As the first step, Hill moved to Taiwan to find the best suppliers for the machine.
Sometime in 2018, Hill was in Taichung meeting with different manufacturers for parts and components. He ran into Mark Chang in a cafe shop. Chang was a young and ambitious man, who had experience launching a startup in the chemistry sector before and was looking for the next opportunities. These two were perfect for each other, as Chang could help find local manufacturers with his connections, and Hill got the startup idea. In 2022, Aquivio was founded by Hill and Chang.
The vision of Aquivio is to make healthier beverages available and affordable for everyone. Its device provides premium Alkaline hydrogen water and functional drinks, which are low in calories, sugar-free, rich in vitamins, and enhanced by plant extracts, caffeine, or other functional ingredients. By applying customization to the machine, users can opt for beverages for their personal health and fitness goals. With the innovation in assembling and machine designs, Aquivio embeds eight flavor or infusion channels inside the device and achieves easy maintenance and a semi-automated cleaning cycle of the dispensers.
“The underlying magic of our device is a specific design based on the water treatment technology,” said Hill. Hydrogen is a biologically active molecule (H2), which has many properties, including anti-apoptotic, anti-inflammatory, and antioxidant properties. In Japan, there are treatments that involve inhaled hydrogen gas. However, it takes a lot of money and hours to inhale hydrogen. Directly drinking water with hydrogen suits much better to daily lifestyle. The water dispenser of Aquivio sets a fixed amount of hydrogen level in the water so that users can have the antioxidant naturally by drinking water.
Thinking outside the box, Aquivio innovates the business models for water dispensers
As a veteran in water dispenser retailing for years, Hill already knew that selling these machines to households is a luxurious business. Taking an unconventional approach, Hill decided to rent out the devices.
Aiming to make this device mainstream, Hill innovates the business models to catalyze the possibility to scale. By renting the machines, gyms or companies can also earn profits every time end users pay for the beverages. Compared to canned or bottled drinks, users end up paying only 30% of the price for the drinks from Aquivio’s water dispenser. The rented machine creates sustainable revenues for the facilities while also saving expenses for individual users.
A fully stacked machine can provide up to 2,600 cups of drinks, much enough for facilities to sustain for a long period of time. Moreover, businesses can customize the supplement ratios in accordance with their customer's needs. For example, people who work out at the gym might need electrolyte water more than water with caffeine. Aquivio also comes up with a month pass for individual users, through which they can claim two drinks every day and pay at a discounted price. The monthly pass encourages users to get back to the gyms on a daily basis, forming dynamics for healthy lifestyles.
In gyms and workspaces, you now can enjoy alkaline hydrogen water at a lower price than a bottled drink. Drinking hydrogen water from Aquivio’s dispenser is cheaper, healthier, and more eco-friendly. Aquivio now has collaborated with Taiwanese gym chains including CrossFit BaKeSi, Hypercore Fitness, and Achilles Gym, serving water to customers in gyms.
For the next step, Aquivio plans to launch its U.S. debut in May. When Hill was a professional athlete and world champion, he spent years in the United States for his bodybuilding career and made acquaintances with Edward Connors, co-founder of the Gold's Gym franchise, who becomes Hill’s mentor now. With rich experiences in the fitness industry and the U.S. market, Connors has supported Aquivio and helped with finding the product-market fit for this water dispenser.
The startup just closed its seed round, led by Jameson Hsu, CEO and co-founder of Kinetik; Kent Wu, former COO of Just Kitchen, and Elias Ek, co-founder and CEO of Enspyre. To optimize its service, Aquivio is now developing software matching its water dispenser, which helps users track real-time hydrogen consumption and analyze users’ drinking behaviors. Aquivio plans to bring its unique product to the masses and make a splash in the highly competitive U.S. market.
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