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MyFitnessPal has selected Yarken to manage its artificial intelligence spending, a move that led to a recurring six-figure annual reduction in overheads.
An initial review found gaps between contracted software licences and actual usage across the business.
These included discrepancies in seat counts and a pattern showing that users without spending caps generated 80 per cent of extra-usage charges. By reallocating seats, MyFitnessPal cut ongoing costs while maintaining its AI investment.
The work focused on improving financial control and visibility over AI expenditure, including token consumption, licensing and budgeting. MyFitnessPal uses AI from several major vendors for features such as image processing, voice logging and natural language interfaces.
That multi-vendor setup created a fragmented view of spending, as each supplier billed and reported usage differently. MyFitnessPal also had to track costs across employees and external contractors under a two-tier pricing model in which enterprise seats cost more.
Using telemetry from Yarken's platform, the MyFitnessPal team reviewed licence-tier usage and made upgrades, downgrades and other changes to better match demand. It then used the data to build annual AI operating budgets.
MyFitnessPal said it has more than 280 million users globally. Its app offers calorie tracking, personalised insights and meal planning for people following different weight-loss and dietary approaches.
Cost scrutiny
The deal reflects a wider challenge for finance leaders as companies expand their use of AI tools without consistent ways to measure usage costs or link spending to business activity. Charges can vary between vendors and rise quickly when token consumption, software subscriptions and specialist labour are managed in separate systems.
Yarken said its AI Economics module brings together committed, fixed and variable AI costs, along with contract commitments, licence costs, specialist teams, labour, consulting and related technology spending. The aim is to give finance and technology teams a single view of expenditure.
For companies adopting AI services across departments, the issue often goes beyond cloud or software bills. Budget holders may be managing premium licences for staff, temporary access for contractors, model usage charges and shifts in token pricing, all of which can make forecasting difficult.
"At MyFitnessPal, AI is already a key part of how we create value for our users. It powers features across both MyFitnessPal and our Cal AI offer, which serve our free and paying subscribers every day. As that investment grows, visibility and management of AI spend become essential, and we have partnered with Yarken to bring clarity and connect every dollar to the experiences it enables. We've also made a deliberate choice to put AI platforms in the hands of every employee. Helping our people develop these skills is an investment in their future and in the long-term strength of our business," Herving Sanchez, Chief Financial Officer at MyFitnessPal, said.
The reference to Cal AI suggests MyFitnessPal is using AI across more than one product line, increasing the importance of tracking where spending occurs and how it maps to user-facing services.
Broader market
Yarken was founded to address technology spending across cloud, software and infrastructure, and has since extended that approach to AI economics. The MyFitnessPal deployment was built around real-time monitoring of consumption and licence use, with a focus on helping finance teams understand where money is being spent and how budgets should be adjusted.
Ravi Kuppan, Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Yarken, said: "Yarken and MyFitnessPal share a vision of how AI creates tangible business value. AI should never just be an IT expense line. While we are all excited about how AI can improve business performance, such a strategic investment cannot be left unmanaged. MyFitnessPal's forward-looking approach to AI consumption, just like its pioneering app, shows the future of AI Economics."
Yarken is also a founding member of the Linux Foundation's Tokenomics Foundation, alongside JPMorganChase, Oracle, SAP and ServiceNow.