Wired For Performance: The Emergence Of Tech-Enabled Activewear

When most of the world was stuck baking banana bread and bingeing on Netflix during the Covid-19 lockdown, Singapore-based entrepreneur Gunjan Datta was turning his master bedroom into a fully equipped gym – dumbbell racks, leg press and all – and spent the next two years sleeping on yoga mats between machines.

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“Our friends thought my wife and I were crazy,” the 43-year-old permanent resident says with a laugh. “But fitness for me has been a way of life, a way to deal with the lowest and most challenging times of my life.”

He and his business-partner wife Puja, 43, have a nine-year-old son.

It is this unrelenting pursuit of physical and personal excellence that powers Zoda, the tech-and-sustainability-driven activewear brand he launched in Singapore in early 2024. It is available online at zoda.sg.

One of its innovative products? A T-shirt that is said to help fight climate change.

The Straits Times met Mr Datta one afternoon in April, when he arrived with a cardboard box full of gear. Pulling out an unassuming brown T-shirt emblazoned with the words “The power lies within”, he casually says: “This absorbs carbon dioxide.”

Developed with Singapore-based biotech start-up Xinterra, the CO2Terra fabric used in Zoda’s $69 Carbon Capture Tee is said to do more than just keep perspiration at bay or offer a flattering fit. With every wash, the material absorbs carbon dioxide from the air – between 16g and 41g over the garment’s lifetime – and converts it into harmless minerals that are washed down the drain.

But sustainability is just one part of Zoda’s innovation playbook.

The brand is also experimenting with interactive apparel, using NFC (near field communication) technology developed by Europe-based tech company Zatap embedded directly into its garments.

Mr Datta demonstrates by tapping his mobile phone on a small patch on the chest of a $65 NFC Tee. Instantly, a video launches showcasing the brand’s ethos, athlete community and the story behind the garment itself.