SLO’s Mindbody names new CEO
Mindbody, a software firm for the wellness industry that is one of San Luis Obispo’s biggest tech companies, announced the hiring of a new CEO on Aug. 2.
Fritz Lanman will take over on Sept. 3, the company said. The current CEO, Josh McCarter, will move to Mindbody’s board of directors.
Lanman is currently the president of Mindbody’s ClassPass business unit and was CEO of ClassPass before it was acquired by Mindbody in October.
The terms of that deal were not disclosed, but Mindbody did say it was the largest acquisition in the company’s history, and ClassPass had been valued at around $1 billion in its last venture capital round. At the same time as the ClassPass acquisition, Mindbody closed a $500 million funding round, the biggest round of any company in the tri-county region in 2021.
Mindbody, which provides cloud software to gyms, yoga studios and other fitness businesses, was publicly traded from 2015 to 2019, when it was acquired by Vista Equity Partners for $1.9 billion. When the ClassPass acquisition closed, it grew to about 1,900 employees, 500 of them on the Central Coast.
ClassPass is also a software company in the wellness space, but its platform is for consumers, while Mindbody’s is for businesses.
Mindbody’s founder, Rick Stollmeyer, stepped down as CEO in July 2020 and was replaced by McCarter, who had previously been the company’s president.
Lanman started his career and Microsoft and joined Class Pass in 2013. He led ClassPass through its seed and Series A funding rounds and its acquisition by Mindbody.
“It has been an honor leading Mindbody through the pandemic and bringing together the two leading wellness businesses, Mindbody and ClassPass, with our acquisition of ClassPass last October,” McCarter said in the company’s Aug. 2 news release. “It’s the right time to pass the baton to Fritz who will lead Mindbody through this next chapter. Fritz’s tech and entrepreneurial background and his CEO experience make him the perfect fit to lead Mindbody and ClassPass.”
