CuraMaker

The two co-founders of CuraMaker, Dr Chong Yeh Woei and Wong Kien Haw, share a friendship that spans more than a decade. Both being gourmands – they often caught up over good food and drinks, enjoyed chatting about the whole nine yards, where the topic of health regularly underpinned their conversations. One day back in 2011, while having dinner, both men deliberated on what they can do to help people better manage their health. Dr Chong unfolded a napkin lying on the table, and started illustrating ‘sugar hills’ (blood sugar spikes) - line charts with troughs and peaks. This was followed by many hours of conversation around how foods, which raises and cause one’s blood sugar levels to fluctuate can be damaging to one’s health. The topic of ‘sugar hills’ was rekindled in 2016 when Dr Chong and Kien talked about the ‘death by sugar’ across the Southeast Asian population, and was spurred to do something to help people make informed decisions on their dietary lifestyles. Together with a team of machine-learning specialists, Dr Chong and Kien developed the CuraMaker metabolics analysis platform (MAP), which provided a 3-month forward predicted range of HbA1c (average blood sugar levels) values. Over time, further refinement made to CuraMaker’s MAP provided more dynamic insights, so people didn’t have to wait 3 months to find out whether their food consumption patterns were good or bad. In 2020, CuraMaker 2.0 was ready. Paired with the Abbott Freestyle Libre, the CuraMaker app (powered by MAP) offered its users powerful, personalised insights on the cause and effect of foods/meals consumed. During the CuraMaker 14-day programme, users are guided on how to achieve their health and fitness goals with these insights - be it to lose weight, reduce your waist circumference, increase your fitness performance, take early action to prevent chronic diseases or minimise dependence on medication to alleviate chronic diseases.