Case Study: Whoop achieves rapid prototyping and accelerated time-to-market for competitive wearables with Protolabs' machining and molding

How Whoop Inc. used rapid manufacturing to accelerate its design cycles and get to market faster

WHOOP, a Boston-based fitness tech startup building a high‑precision wearable for athletes, faced the challenge of producing very small, thin‑walled plastic components and fast physical prototypes to validate sensor placement, accuracy, and everyday wearability while racing established competitors like Fitbit and Apple. WHOOP turned to Protolabs for rapid machining and molding services, plus automated quoting and DFM support, to meet tight tolerances and short development cycles during Alpha and Beta testing.

Protolabs manufactured machined and molded housings and bottom components that let WHOOP iterate quickly—using pilot end‑use builds to move from prototype to production. Protolabs’ capabilities and DFM feedback shaved more than two weeks off initial CAD and prototyping, accelerated WHOOP’s time‑to‑market to 1‑ to 24‑month product cycles, and helped WHOOP secure MLB approval, an NFLPA partnership, broad pro‑team adoption, and expansion into new industries.

WHOOP

Aurelian Nicolae

Co-Founder and Product Engineer