CEO Corner: Climatic’s Eric Kau on Bringing Lung Health Into the Mainstream

Kau, a former executive at Seed Health and Chewy, co-founded Climatic, whose inaugural product, L Max, promises to change the way we breathe

Eric Kau wants to make taking care of your lungs as simple as brushing your teeth. 

To accomplish that, Kau, the former chief operating officer of Seed Health, and Allie Melnick, a former Harry’s executive, co-founded Climatic in 2023. In January, the company raised $10 million in seed funding to support product development. 

The startup’s inaugural product, L Max, is formulated to clear buildup so people can breathe easier throughout the day. L Max launched in April and sold out in 14 days, according to Climatic. Pre-orders are now open for a summer re-release, retailing for $55 per month or $95 for a one-time purchase.  

Climatic’s long-term vision extends beyond just lung health: in time, the company plans to release additional products designed to help people live better in a world that’s increasingly full of environmental toxins. 

Kau sat down with Athletech News to discuss his and Melnick’s mission for Climatic, why he believes lung health is the next big opportunity in wellness, and what’s in store for Climatic in the future. 

The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and length. 

Athletech News: Can you tell us a bit about your background before co-founding Climatic?

Eric Kau: I’ve spent the majority of my career scaling mission-driven health tech companies, from early-stage up through rapid growth and often an exit. Prior to founding Climatic, I was the chief operating officer at Seed Health, built out the operational infrastructure and led channel and product expansion as we got into retail, into ecommerce, and ultimately into other product categories or verticals within the probiotic space. Prior to that, I was part of the founding team at chewy.com, in a similar role there. I’ve also led the vitamin, mineral and supplements category at Amazon.

ATN: Why did you decide on Climatic as your next project?

EK: I’ve developed a passion for human health and science — part of it has to do with, as I’ve aged, focusing a bit more on my health. 

But I’ve also got a personal pride in bringing products that can help people in their everyday lives. We saw that on a large scale at Seed, and with Climatic, we see an opportunity to address another unmet consumer need. We take 20,000 breaths a day, (yet) lung health still remains largely absent from preventative care routines. Lung health directly impacts endurance recovery, athletic performance and overall health, so it seems like a real gap that there isn’t a real kind of scientifically backed solution out there that you can take every day for preventative care.

ATN: How does L Max, Climatic’s inaugural product, work? 

EK: It’s an all-natural, safe, daily inhaled solution. Much like you get up and brush your teeth in the morning, or you get up and take your multivitamin, you get up and take one deep inhale, and then it supports lung function by clearing the airways to support easier breathing and therefore improved performance. 

The product itself has been clinically tested, and then we’ve gone through third-party toxicity validations to double-confirm that it’s safe for human and daily use.

ATN: Who’s your target market for L Max at launch? 

EK: We like to say it’s for everybody who breathes. But I think we’re really designing it for athletes, high-performers, wellness optimizers and health-conscious consumers.

ATN: Climatic has stressed that it’s a research-backed company. How is this playing out in practice so far?

EK: We’ve done a handful of different studies. I think the most significant one is an in vivo study with Mount Sinai Medical Center, which demonstrated a 50% improvement in mucociliary clearance. And those effects are observed within minutes after using L Max, and are sustained for hours. 

In an endurance study, 98% of athletes reported easier breathing during their workouts. They saw a 6% improvement in time-trial performance, whether that was biking or running, and 80% of the athletes showed HRV improvements within a two-week period. Further studies have shown there’s a benefit of compounding use, so you don’t just get that benefit in the moment, but you can compound the benefits by using it every day. 

Right now, we’re running a placebo-controlled, double-blind clinical study with a larger set of participants to further build the scientific rigor around the product. 

ATN: How important is educating consumers on the importance of using a lung-health product, especially since the category hasn’t really existed before Climatic? 

EK: In a post-COVID world, I think we’re all more aware of our respiratory health. You’re seeing breathing and breathwork showing up in a variety of different areas, for stress, sleep and reduced hypertension. So while it’s maybe not as large as other categories, there are tailwinds in that consumers are becoming substantially more aware of the importance of lung health. We think this is the next category in human health. We strongly believe that the consumer is ready for a product like this.

ATN: During Climatic’s $10 million seed funding round, it was mentioned that the company wants to create more products in addition to L Max. What’s your vision for the future of Climatic?

EK: Our initial focus is on establishing daily lung care with L Max. The goal is to make this an everyday habit, like brushing your teeth. Everybody breathes 20,000 times a day, so the more that we can get word out there, the more we have a healthy population. 

But long-term, the vision includes expanding into broader environmental health solutions. We’re thinking about this as “climate adaptive health,” recognizing that we live in a world that’s having an increasingly negative impact on our bodies — 99% of the global population lives in an air quality that the World Health Organization would say is below standard — so we’ll continue to look at where consumers are struggling in that area, and look to find novel, scientifically backed solutions to help.