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Dave Asprey (born October 30,1972) is an American entrepreneur, author and marketer of pseudoscientific fad diets.[1][2][3] He founded Bulletproof 360, Inc. in 2013,[4] and in 2017, founded Bulletproof Nutrition Inc.[5] Men's Health described Asprey as a "lifestyle guru".[6]

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Dave Asprey
Asprey in December 2018
Born	(1972-10-30) October 30, 1972 (age 50) Albuquerque, New Mexico
Nationality	American
Education	UC Santa Barbara (B.S. computer science) California State University, Stanislaus (B.S.) Wharton (M.B.A.)
Known for	Bulletproof Coffee and the Bulletproof diet
Website	www.bulletproof.com

Asprey is also known for his early adoption of the Internet for commerce and selling caffeine-molecule t-shirts via the alt.drugs.caffeine newsgroup in 1994 and his promotion of the "biohacker" movement.[7][8][9][10]

Previously, Asprey held executive and director positions for technology companies including Trend Micro, Blue Coat Systems, and Citrix Systems.[11]

Career

Asprey attended UCSB and majored in computer science and later earned his undergraduate degree in computer information systems from California State University, Stanislaus.[12] He went on to earn an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.[13]

After graduation from college, Asprey worked in the IT industry for companies that included Bradshaw[14] and 3Com.[15] He also taught and ran the Internet and web engineering program at University of California, Santa Cruz, in which Asprey created one of the first working instances of cloud computing.[16][17] Later, he joined Exodus Communications as director of strategic planning,[18] where he co-founded the company's professional services group.[16]

His first startup was an early-stage e-commerce company founded around 1993, which was featured in Entrepreneur magazine. Eventually, the company delivered products to customers in 10 countries, including Australia, the United Kingdom, South Africa, and several parts of Asia, making it one of the first worldwide e-commerce businesses.[17]

Asprey was the director of product management for a Silicon Valley startup called NetScaler which was later acquired by Citrix Systems.[16] After working at Citrix, Asprey served as the vice president of marketing for Zeus Technology[19] and later, vice president of technology and corporate development at Blue Coat Systems.[20] He then became an entrepreneur in residence at Trinity Ventures before co-founding a company called Basis.[11] Asprey was the vice president of cloud security for Trend Micro[21] before he left to run his own business full-time.[22]

Asprey founded Bulletproof 360, Inc. in 2013[4] and founded Bulletproof Nutrition Inc. in 2014.[5][23]

Asprey initially started the Bulletproof brand after developing Bulletproof Coffee. He posted the recipe for the beverage and details on the health benefits he experienced on his website while still working for Trend Micro.[22] Asprey also developed "low-mold coffee beans", oils, and supplements and started selling them on his website in 2011.[24] The following year, Asprey was a panelist at the “Hack Your Brain” event at South by Southwest. By 2013, Asprey had left his position at Trend Micro to run the Bulletproof companies.[22]

Asprey also runs a podcast, Bulletproof Radio, which had been downloaded more than 75 million times as of January 2019.[6][24] The stated goal of Bulletproof Nutrition is to enhance human performance. It supports the Quantified Self movement as a way to empower individuals to understand and 'hack' their own health.[25]

In 2014, Asprey authored The Bulletproof Diet published by Rodale Books.[1]

On July 25, 2015, Asprey opened a cafe in Santa Monica selling Bulletproof Coffee and high fat foods.[24][26]

In July 2015, Asprey raised $9 million from Trinity Ventures to expand the company.[27]

In July of 2018, Bulletproof 360, Inc. reported raising more than $40 million in equity and debt financing, led by the food and beverage investment firm CAVU Venture Partners. Other investors in the round were Trinity Ventures and Silicon Valley Bank.[28]

In Sept, 2019, Bulletproof announced Dave Asprey had stepped down as CEO but would continue to focus on his role as Executive Chairman.[29]

In Sept 2021, Dave Asprey announced franchising his new venture, Upgrade Labs.[30]

Bulletproof diet

The Bulletproof diet developed and marketed by Asprey recommends eating foods high in fat, moderate in protein, and low in carbohydrates with a foundation being the consumption of "Bulletproof Coffee", a coffee made and marketed by Asprey.[31][32]

Asprey developed his Bulletproof Coffee recipe after traveling to Tibet and tasting yak-butter tea drinks.[33] He returned to the United States and experimented with buttered drink recipes and published the preparation for his buttered coffee drink on his blog in 2009.[34][35] The Bulletproof diet also recommends incorporating intermittent fasting.[31]

Asprey has claimed that when used in combination with other "health hacks", the coffee helped to boost his IQ score by more than 20 points.[34]

His company claims that Bulletproof Coffee can aid cognition and trigger weight loss through ketosis.[36]

Asprey warns coffee drinkers to avoid mold toxins such as ochratoxin in coffee,[37][38] which he claims "steals your mental edge and actually makes you weak." Asprey asserts that mycotoxins are harmful substances produced by coffee-bean-growing molds (among other things). Asprey indicates that these molecules are responsible for a wide range of health issues, including cardiomyopathy, cancer, hypertension, kidney disease, and even brain damage. Additionally, he claims they make coffee taste bitter, as it requires sugar.[39] Asprey sells a brand of "upgraded" beans that are advertised as having undergone a secret, proprietary process to reduce mycotoxin levels.[40][26] Physician David Bach says that coffee producers already able to remove mycotoxins from their product and that there is no evidence to support Asprey's claim that mycotoxins make people "sluggish".[41]

Reception

Critics have described the Bulletproof diet as simplistic, invalid and unscientific.[3] Asprey has no medical degree or nutritional training.[6]

Vox contributor Julia Belluz criticized the Bulletproof diet referring to it as "like a caricature of a bad fad-diet book". Belluz wrote particularly against claims that changing diet can reduce inflammation and lead to weight loss, saying Asprey ignored contradictory studies about the health benefits of certain foods, and inappropriately extrapolated studies on animals, very small groups of people, and people with specific diseases to the general human population.[42] Edmed Scott, a powerlifter, also pointed out that Asprey claims to have scientific evidence supporting the benefits and advantages of his diet, yet the research he cites are "cherry-picked" and of poor quality. The vast majority are conducted on rats and are irrelevant to human health.[43]

Dietitian Lynn Weaver criticized the diet as being hard to follow and supported by only small studies that are "not generally part of the scientific literature used by medical and nutritional professionals".[32]

Dietitians also point out there is no scientific basis for claims of an IQ boost, and that any sense of alertness from Bulletproof Coffee is "just a caffeine buzz".[36][44]

Asprey has been accused of making false health claims about his vitamin products to prevent and treat COVID-19.[45] An article by Science-Based Medicine commented that "Asprey’s output combines cherry-picked science with pseudoscience, wrapped up in a self-experimentation ethos that superficially sounds compelling but falls short in actual evidence". In 2020, the Federal Trade Commission sent Asprey a warning letter telling him any "coronavirus-related prevention claims regarding such products are not supported by competent and reliable scientific evidence. You must immediately cease making all such claims".[46]

Personal life

Asprey has said that he expects to live to age 180.{{Citation needed|date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}}}

As of 2019, Asprey said he had spent at least $1 million "hacking his own biology", including having his own stem cells injected into him, taking 100 daily supplements, following a strict diet, bathing in infrared light, using a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, and wearing special lenses when flying or using a computer.{{Citation needed|date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}}} Asprey has also spoken about how biohacking has positively impacted his sexual health.[47]

Asprey met his wife, Lana Asprey, a physician, at an anti-aging conference. They live in Vancouver Island, Canada.[6] He claimed that following the Bulletproof diet helped his wife with her polycystic ovary syndrome.[48]

Bibliography

• The Better Baby Book (2013) co-authored with his wife Lana Asprey, ASIN B00DNL3I7K
• The Bulletproof Diet (2014), ISBN 162336518X, 978-1623365189
• Headstrong (2017), ISBN 9780062652416, 978-0062652416
• Game Changers: What Leaders, Innovators, and Mavericks Do to Win at Life (2018),[49] ISBN 0062652443, 978-0062652447
• Super Human: The Bulletproof Plan to Age Backward and Maybe Even Live Forever (2019), ISBN 0062882821, 978-0062882820
• Fast This Way: Burn Fat, Heal Inflammation, and Eat Like the High-Performing Human You Were Meant to Be (2021), ISBN 0062882864, 978-0062882868

See also

• Paleo diet
• Fad diet
• Pseudoscience
• Nutrition

References

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