The Path, founded by Tony Robbins and Calm alums, hopes to offer safer AI therapy

When the founders of a mental health app for men called Mental saw that one feature — AI interactive audio — was resonating wildly with their users, they knew they were onto something. And so the idea for a new, and hopefully safer, kind of AI therapy app was born, which they called The Path , co-founder and CEO Anson Whitmer tells TechCrunch. Then famed author and motivational speaker Tony Robbins grew so enamored with this startup; he scooched in as a co-founder. The Path has now raised $14.3 million in seed funding led by Prime Movers Lab (where Robbins is a partner), with participation from speed skater Apolo Anton Ohno, boxer Deontay Wilder, and Designer Fund. After Prime Movers invested, Robbins began chatting with Whitmer and co-founder Tyler Sheaffer on small stuff like branding, but as his enthusiasm and ideas for the app grew, they offered to bring him in as a co-founder. The author has since helped shape The Path into a therapy-plus-coaching app that taps into Robbins’ popular self-improvements methods. Whitmer, formerly an early employee at meditation app Calm alongside Sheaffer, says his pursuit of mental health tech was born out of tragic experiences: When he was 19, a beloved uncle committed suicide. That inspired Whitmar to get a PhD in psychology, and he planned to go into research after graduation. But while he was in college, a cousin left a voicemail. “I didn’t realize until it was too late. …