In the past, we already had an amazing conversation with João Pedro Ribeiro, CEO of PeekMed, regarding the health tech industry and how he saw it evolving.
Today we’re talking about the health of our furry friends.
We sat down with João Campaniço, cofounder of Purrmi and now NutriPetPlan, to discuss his views on the challenges of the pet industry, especially when it comes to the health of our companions. His mission is to combat the suffering of pets affected by chronic, irreversible diseases that can be prevented with proper nutrition and care.
Context
João is very familiar with innovation and the startup world, and Purrmi was not his first startup by far. However, it was his first business in the pet industry.
He and his brother realized there weren’t clean-label, natural, and easily accessible high-quality foods for cats that help them stay healthy and prevent obesity and chronic illness.
João tells us, “For cats, 35% die from chronic diseases, and owners often face high costs trying to save their pets. But prevention is the only real answer.”
For João and his brother building Purrmi was a real challenge since they had never created a business with a physical product and expiration date. The logistics of production and shipment, the physical labor, and adherence to strict health standards… Very different from coding an app, or even better, vibe-coding it!
Applying AI to prevent animal diseases
Four years after founding Purrmi, João and Francisco returned to their roots to apply AI in petcare.
“Animals can’t tell us when they’re sick,” he reflects. “Unlike humans who seek help or have insurance, our pets rely entirely on us. We needed a way to read their silent signs early, to catch problems before it’s too late.”
They announced NutriPetPlan, an expansion of Purrmi’s offerings. The mission remains the same: to help pets stay healthy and prevent diseases through nutrition. The platform allows online purchases of healthy pet food, and, leveraging LLM capabilities, offers easy personalization. Recently, João announced an AI-powered bot designed not to diagnose but to analyze, alert, and guide. Using age, weight, photos, and health history, NutriPetPlan creates a fast health snapshot of your pet, while also allowing users to contact a vet directly. They aim for their technology to become a trustworthy guide for pet owners.
“Owners care deeply, but often don’t know what’s best. NutriPetPlan saves them mental energy and time, turning complex health info (like pet’s food labels or pet’s health metrics) into clear, actionable advice.”
With “all-in-one” or “super apps” becoming especially popular in countries like China and the UAE, NutriPetPlan is truly innovative in the fragmented and outdated pet care industry. NutriPetPlan combines an e-commerce platform for pet food, supplements, medicines, and accessories; an instant personalized health report generated by the AI-powered bot; and the option to receive online nutritional guidance from a vet.
Building with AI comes with its challenges
Six years ago, João co-founded an AI company that qualified leads with AI agents. He leveraged his past expertise and, along with the team, adapted it to the current evolution of LLMs and their frameworks.
We, especially those up to date with the AI technology that read Beyond the Mainframe, know AI might be magical, but comes with its challenges. Because this technology is probabilistic — meaning it guesses the most likely correct answer, it can be misleading sometimes, which the ML Engineers call “hallucinations”. So, ensuring that mechanisms are in place to guarantee the quality of outputs is critical.
“Especially in medicine, in this case for pets, it’s critical to ensure reliable outputs since we’re dealing with lives. At the moment, we still need a vet professional to validate and help train the model. We want to automate the process as much as we can, for example, using the AI bot as an intermediary, so that one vet can reach even more people.”
Another important aspect is to guarantee the quality of training data used in the algorithm. Even though NutriPetPlan can be an engine to get training data, that is not the way the founders see it. João mentioned, “Our models have data privacy by design, and we never keep the information provided.” They obtain training data through partnerships with vets and veterinary groups to collect the necessary data points. Collecting that data would be costly, but thankfully the EU has created incentives, such as consortiums, to encourage companies to partner and to collect, process, and qualify the data used to train AI models. Right now, NutriPetPlan is partnering with I3S and OneVet (the largest vet clinics group in Iberia), among others.
How does this change the pet industry
Moving from “seeking advice in an animal store for the best product for my pet” to consulting AI is an indisputable step - offering better quality, reliability, and personalized information.
“The humanization of pets is real. Pet owners mirror their own worries in their pets.”
And eventually, in a not-so-distant future, they will seek similar solutions for their pets. This shift moves the pet industry away from fragmented, low-tech solutions toward a more digital, data-centered experience that enables preventive and proactive care of our beloved pets. Purrmi was the first step, confirming the need for healthier, natural food options to prevent diseases. People are indeed investing more in better products for their pets, as well as for themselves.
As humans wear Whoops and Oura rings, buy organic food and vitamins, and have online consultations, pets will similarly wear Maven collars, buy Purrmi, and track their health through NutriPetPlan.