.png)
_converted.avif)
A random dinner invitation. A flight to London. A conversation about a problem David Beckham couldn't solve with all the doctors and nutritionists money could buy.
That's how IM8 started.
And in eleven months, it went from zero to $100 million in annualized recurring revenue — making it one of the fastest growing supplement brands ever recorded. Now they're inside Inter Miami's nutrition center. Messi's taking it. Giannis is an equity partner. So is Aryna Sabalenka, Ollie Bearman, and the club itself.
Danny Yeung didn't set out to build a supplement company. He set out to solve a problem. That's the whole story.
On this episode of the Playbook HQ Podcast, the co-founder and CEO of IM8 breaks down how a chance dinner with David Beckham turned into a $200 million business, why he ran clinical trials before he ever launched a product, and how a kid who dropped out of high school at 15 and sold baseball cards at 12 ended up building one of the most credentialed supplement brands on the planet.
Danny Yeung has been building companies since he was a teenager. Restaurant at 24. E-commerce business in Hong Kong that got acquired by Groupon. Then Prenetics — a life sciences diagnostics company he started in 2014 that did $800 million in revenue during COVID, listed on NASDAQ at a billion-dollar-plus valuation, and then had to completely reinvent itself when the world stopped needing COVID tests.
That reinvention started with a dinner invitation.
A friend in Hong Kong mentioned he was meeting David Beckham in London the following week. Casually asked if Danny wanted to join. Danny's logic was simple: there's no downside to meeting a legend. He flew over.
They got along immediately. Beckham was intrigued by Danny's background — the life sciences depth from Prenetics, the DTC consumer experience from the Groupon acquisition. And then the conversation got personal.
Even with a full team of doctors and nutritionists around him, Beckham was taking a dozen or more supplements a day. He and Victoria were doing it. And when they traveled — which is constantly — keeping up with that regimen was a logistical nightmare.
Danny heard a problem. His brain went straight to the solution.
"There must be a better way to do this."
After countless conversations, they landed on the concept together: replace 16 different supplements in a single powder format. One great-tasting drink, every morning. That was IM8.
Most supplement companies launch a product and figure out the science later. IM8 did it backwards — and that was the whole point.
Danny spent 12 years in clinical diagnostics. He knew exactly what the supplement industry looked like without regulation. No FDA oversight. No accountability. A lot of labels making claims nobody had tested.
So before IM8 ever went to market, they ran clinical trials. The San Francisco Research Institute validated the efficacy of the finished product. EuroFINS handled third-party ingredient testing. NSF Certified for Sport certification — which screens for over 280 banned substances — came standard, because the target audience included professional athletes who couldn't afford to take chances.
The formulation itself was built by a team that doesn't cut corners: a physician-scientist who spent 20+ years at the Mayo Clinic, the former chief scientist of NASA, and a microbiome professor from the University of Sydney.
The result is a daily supplement that covers gut health, sleep, energy, and recovery — formulated at clinical dosages, not the trace amounts that make labels look impressive without doing anything.
Danny's challenge to anyone considering it: put every ingredient into ChatGPT or Gemini and compare it against whatever you're currently taking. He's confident in what comes back.
The number sounds impossible. It isn't — but it required getting everything right at the same time.
It started with product. Clinical dosages. Tested ingredients. A formulation that actually does what it says. That's table stakes, but most brands don't clear it.
Then came the brand architecture. Beckham as co-founder wasn't a celebrity endorsement — it was a founding partnership. And every athlete that followed wasn't brought on for reach alone. Aryna Sabalenka. Ollie Bearman. Giannis Antetokounmpo. Jay Shetty. Inter Miami CF. Every single one of them is an equity holder in Prenetics.
"They take the product every day and they believe in the long-term vision," Danny says. "Not just today — three, five, ten years out."
That structure changes everything. These aren't paid spokespeople who rotate out when the contract ends. They're investors with skin in the game, which means their endorsement carries a different kind of weight.
Then there's the digital engine. From day one, IM8 shipped to 30+ countries — now 43. The US represents only 40% of their market, with Canada, UK, Australia, and Singapore rounding out the top five. Most brands spend years building domestically before thinking about international. IM8 launched globally on purpose.
On Meta and Google, they run nearly 3,000 ads simultaneously. Every week, they test 600 to 800 new creatives. Each ad leads to a personalized landing page built around a specific consumer persona — athletes, entrepreneurs, office workers, active parents. The funnel is different for each one. What works gets scaled. What doesn't gets cut. Fast.
"We test at scale," Danny says. "That gives us significant opportunity to learn what works and what doesn't — and AI has made all of it faster."
The result: $100M ARR in 11 months. $200M ARR in 18 months. Projected full-year 2026 revenue of $200M+.
Most brand deals take weeks. The Inter Miami partnership took two years.
Danny started conversations with the club before IM8 even launched publicly in summer 2024. The announcement came two months before this conversation. That gap tells you everything about how seriously both sides took it.
Getting a supplement brand embedded inside a professional soccer club isn't a marketing exercise. Every product has to be cleared by team physicians and nutritionists. It has to be safe not just for one player but for every member of the organization — including Lionel Messi.
IM8 cleared every hurdle. The brand now has a dedicated IM8 Nutrition Center at Inter Miami's Florida Blue Training Center. Core products are available to all players and performance staff daily. The club has group NIL rights with a minimum of four Inter Miami players and in-stadium branding at their stadium.
But the structural detail that makes this deal different from every other sports supplement partnership: Inter Miami took an equity stake in Prenetics. For the first time in the club's history, they have direct upside in a brand partner's growth.
For Beckham, it's a full-circle moment. He co-founded IM8. He co-owns Inter Miami. Now the club he built from scratch is invested in the supplement company he helped launch.
"Some of the best things you have to be patient," Danny says. "You can't rush it."
Danny Yeung grew up an immigrant in the US. His family didn't have money. He started selling baseball cards at 12. Dropped out of high school at 15. Became a telemarketer. Was working full-time in internet companies at 18. Started his first business — a restaurant — at 24.
He sees himself in Jack Ma. Not just the immigrant story or the scrappy start. The willingness to look at the Western world, identify what was possible, and go build it on different terms.
"Jack had to overcome great odds," Danny says. "And I think there's a lot I can relate to."
That background shapes how he builds. He's not a person who waits for permission or the right moment. He sees a problem — Beckham's supplement stack, the chaos of the COVID diagnostics market, the gap in the DTC e-commerce space in Hong Kong — and builds toward it. Fast.
This is his fourth or fifth company. The pace hasn't slowed.
IM8 Daily Ultimate Essentials | Every morning, non-negotiable. His go-to flavor is Mango Passion Fruit — but he rotates deliberately. Mixed Berries, Lemon Lime Orange, Mango Passion Fruit. Keeps it fresh, avoids flavor fatigue. One serving replaces 16 standalone supplements.
What's Coming | Three new SKUs launching in Q4/Q1: hydration, a supplement kit format, and creatine. All science-backed, all following the same clinical formulation standard as the core product.
His philosophy on supplementation mirrors his philosophy on business: eliminate the complexity, hit the fundamentals at the highest level, and make it something you'll actually stick to every single day.
Danny Yeung said yes to a dinner invitation, flew to London, and listened to David Beckham describe a problem. Everything that followed — the clinical trials, the global launch, the athlete equity partnerships, the Inter Miami deal, the $200 million revenue run — came from that one instinct: find the real problem, then build the cleanest possible solution. IM8 isn't a celebrity supplement brand. It's what happens when a serial entrepreneur with a diagnostics background decides the supplement industry deserves to be held to an actual standard.
.png)
