Meet the Silicon Valley Mental Health Start Up that Prince Harry Just Joined

Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle have been making plenty of headlines in recent days after their appearance in an interview with Oprah Winfrey.

Now Prince Harry has made a headline on his own after joining Sillicon Valley start-up BetterUp, a coaching and mental health platform, as the company’s chief impact officer.

According to the Wall Street Journal who first broke the news, this is the first official role for Harry at a private company since he stepped down from the British royal family.

The Duke of Sussex’s role at the mental health start up created in 2013, will focus on driving advocacy and awareness for mental fitness, guiding BetterUp’s mission, and expanding the company’s community.

San Francisco-based BetterUp was most recently valued at $1.73 billion following a $125 million investment round.

BetterUp has confirmed Prince Harry joining the company in a blog post on Tuesday.

The company’s CEO Alexi Robichaux wrote, “Everyone wants to live a meaningful life. But, there are often barriers — both external and internal — that can limit our ability to do that on our own. That’s why we started BetterUp. We wanted to make a positive impact in the world by empowering millions of people to live their lives with greater clarity, purpose, and passion. ”

He added, “We’re standing at a once-in-a-lifetime crossroad of opportunity as a society. We have the economic, technological, and scientific means to positively impact human potential at scale. But to achieve this, we must “reframe” how we think about human flourishing (the potential we all have), peak performance, and mental fitness.They are not separate pursuits. They are part of one interconnected journey of growth.”

He further wrote, “To meet this opportunity, it is with great pleasure and excitement that we welcome our first Chief Impact Officer: Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex. We are energized by his model of inspiration and impact through action. As a true citizen of the world, he has dedicated his life’s work to bringing attention to the diverse needs of people everywhere and advocating for mental health initiatives: from founding the Invictus Games, a platform for service personnel to use sport as part of their psychological and physical rehabilitation, to launching Sentebale, which supports the mental health and wellbeing of young people affected by HIV in Lesotho and Botswana.”

Recently Prince Harry and Meghan Markle opened up about their reasons for leaving Britain and stepping down from their royal duties, alleging that racism and a lack of support by the royal family for her mental health issues had taken place.

According to BetterUp, the company has a network of over 2,000 coaches and have served more than 100,000 members to date. BetterUp’s coaches have worked with staff at organizations including NASA, Warner Media, Mars and Snapchat-owner Snap.

Harry said he personally found working with a BetterUp coach to be “invaluable,” and that the coach gave him “sound advice” and “a fresh perspective.”

On why he joined the company, he explained that “focusing on and prioritizing our mental fitness unlocks potential and opportunity that we never knew we had inside of us.”