What started as a college capstone project for hDrop Technologies co-founder and CEO Adria Abella has become an innovative technology company with NFL teams and the U.S. Navy as clients.
As a tennis player at Harding University in Searcy, Abella came up with hDrop after experiencing cramps and dehydration during his matches and becoming frustrated with the costly, one-time-use hydration sensors already available on the market.
As a solution, Abella and his co-founders developed a wearable, reusable sensor that tracks hydration status through sweat analysis. The sensor monitors sweat rate, body temperature, and sodium and potassium losses through a user’s skin.
Real-time data is then uploaded to the hDrop app, allowing customers to track their hydration levels, which allows athletes to optimize hydration strategies, potentially improving performance.
The sensor can also track trends during different activities, workout intensities and weather conditions.
Founded in 2019, Little Rock-based hDrop received $50,000 from the Delta Innovation Fund through the Innovate Arkansas program.
Abella said that helped get the company off the ground, but since then, the team has been “bootstrapping absolutely everything.”
“We basically do everything in-house,” Abella said. This includes software development, hardware design and product assembly, which has allowed the company to maintain control over all aspects of its product development and manufacturing.
“That’s one of the beautiful things about entrepreneurship,” Abella said. “That has brought us a lot of benefits. We don’t have to outsource any sort of software development or product development, and we have full control.”
Abella even trained for and ran an Ironman 70.3, a long-distance triathlon race, to test the product.
Most of hDrop’s customers are triathletes and marathon runners, but the company has also attracted other clients, including organizations like the Seattle Seahawks, the University of Alabama, the Carolina Hurricanes, Chevron, the U.S. Air Force, USA Cycling and Ohio State University.
Abella said hDrop is set apart from competitors by its reusability and comprehensive data collection. Although disposable hydration patches have been around longer, they can cost up to $720 per year for someone exercising three times a week; meanwhile, hDrop’s Gen 2 device has a one-time cost of $250. The hDrop sensor is also more sustainable, Abella said, as it reduces waste.
The main difference is that hDrop is able to monitor hydration changes instantly, which is not possible with one-time-use sweat collection patches.
The company launched the Gen 2 sensor in 2023, but its products go beyond hardware. It introduced a feature called Sweat Zones in June; the new offering aims to help users understand and adjust their hydration status during active exercise. Users can test their thumb for immediate hydration levels, and set their workout to light or strenuous for better results.
While initially focused on sports applications, hDrop is also exploring uses in occupational health and medical monitoring.
Dr. Kevin Sexton, hDrop board member and surgeon at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, is investigating the device’s potential for monitoring fluid loss in elderly patients, as well as those with cystic fibrosis and heart failure.
Though hDrop is bootstrapping now, Abella hopes it will scale as people see the importance of tracking hydration through more than just thirst.
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