Curefit fired hundreds of employees and trainers on International Labour Day

• Numerous trainers from curefit have taken to social media to speak about the issue.
• Curefit was founded in 2016 by Myntra co-founder Mukesh Bansal and former Flipkart Chief Business Officer Ankit Nagori.
• The company also has celebrity brand ambassadors like Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff and has over 270 centres across India and Dubai.

Indian chain of gyms and fitness centres, Curefit has laid off hundreds of employees and trainers across the country. Numerous trainers have taken to social media to speak about the issue and said that the irony is the company laid them off on International Labours Day.

These employees were not sent a formal mail but actually got a call saying they should put in their resignation, a source told Business Insider. “I have been with Curefit for a year now, but I got a call on May 1 saying that I have been laid off but I should send a resignation to the company. After that, I spoke to three people from the company and all three gave me different reasons, one said that the company doesn’t have money to pay while another said there are thousands who are being laid off,” a boxing trainer from Cultfit, Mumbai told Business Insider.

Curefit admitted that it had laid off staff. "While we are doing everything we can to solve for our customers, we also need to adjust to the new realities and manage costs to ensure the long term viability of the business. We have downsized our employee base across markets where we have shut operations and have initiated pay cuts across levels. The founders have taken a 100% pay cut, the management team 50% and the rest of the staff depending on seniority have a reduction of 20 to 30%.," the company said.

All employees part of the downsizing have been provided with a significant severance package to help them with the current situation, including extended health insurance for them and their families. "Further, we will provide our full assistance in out-placing them in the coming days. We have also created an emergency fund of Rs 2 Cr to support affected employees in the coming months.," said the company's statement.



Some of the employees also complained that the startup has the money to hire celebrity trainers and donate to the PM Cares fund but couldn’t keep its employees' jobs safe.

Curefit was founded in 2016 by Myntra co-founder Mukesh Bansal and former Flipkart Chief Business Officer Ankit Nagori. It has fitness centres under the Cultfit brand and a health app called Curefit. It also has diagnostic centres called Carefit and yoga and meditation centres called mindfit.

The company also has celebrity brand ambassadors like Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff and has over 270 centres across India and Dubai.

With the coronavirus lockdown, Curefit had to shut down its centres but was quick to pivot and bring the classes online. Its online classes had also gained popularity of late.

The startup is backed by investors like Chiratae Ventures, Accel Partners, Kalaari Capital & Oaktree Capital, Epiq Capital, Unilever Ventures, Innoven Capital and Kotak Mahindra Bank.

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