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Queensland-based biotech startup Gutgutgoose has been accepted into Y Combinator, securing US$500,000 ($790,000) from the Silicon Valley accelerator to develop personalised probiotics tailored to an individual's gut microbiome using AI, microbiome sequencing and metabolic modelling.
Co-founders Anis Mihrshahi, 19, a University of Southern Queensland student, and Leon Mojarrabi, 23, from Griffith University, will relocate to Silicon Valley to participate in the program, which accepts just 0.33 per cent of applicants globally.
The pair are building a platform that analyses a person's gut microbiome and uses computational modelling to design probiotic formulations specific to their biology, rather than relying on the generic, off-the-shelf supplements that dominate the market.
“The gut microbiome is now linked to chronic disease, immune function, and mental health across hundreds of peer-reviewed studies,” says Mojarrabi.
“But the interventions - off-the-shelf probiotics - sold to address it don’t actually engraft in most of the people who buy them. Most strains in a capsule pass straight through the gut.”
Founded to move beyond traditional one-size-fits-all probiotics, Gutgutgoose combines microbiome sequencing, metabolic modelling and AI-driven analysis to create formulations based on an individual’s gut microbiome.
Gutgutgoose has completed an initial alpha cohort and is preparing for a larger beta phase.
The startup is building a longitudinal microbiome dataset designed to better understand how gut health changes over time and support advances in personalised and predictive healthcare.
Mihrshahi says the data challenge is central to the startup's approach.
“The gut shapes everything; the science on that part is settled,” says Mihrshahi.
“AI is supposed to tell us what to do about it, but AI is only as good as the data it learns from, and that data barely exists.
“Every Gutgutgoose customer fills the gap: a before-state, a defined intervention, a verified after-state.”
The startup enters a fast-growing market with Australia's probiotics sector alone valued at US$2 billion ($3.16 billion) in 2025 and forecast to reach US$3.7 billion ($5.85 billion) by 2034, according to research group IMARC.
For Gutgutgoose, the Y Combinator acceptance and move to Silicon Valley represent an early validation of the startup's science-heavy approach.
The Y Combinator funding follows the accelerator's standard deal structure of US$500,000 in exchange for equity and convertible instruments.
Mihrshahi and Mojarrabi regularly study and work from the Inala University Study Hub in Brisbane while continuing to build the company.
They say acceptance into Y Combinator marks a significant milestone in their journey to take Gutgutgoose from "Inala to Silicon Valley and onto the global stage".
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