Twin Cities woman, with Buddhist monk's help, creates tech to help people destress

For years, Quyen Balter struggled with anxiety and insomnia.

It began in high school, brought on by the pressures of achieving academic success and the social dynamics of adolescence.

Her symptoms decreased during college and once she entered the labor force, but returned when she had her first child and her career became more demanding.

Balter turned to meditation, hoping it would soothe her. Over the course of several years, however, her pursuit of calmness was unsuccessful.

"I wasn't able to find something that is easy for me to do," she said. "I tried different meditations apps on the market, but none of them really gave me a concrete path, or an easy path, to start out and guide me throughout my journey."

Unsatisfied with her options, Balter, with the help of a Buddhist monk in Minnesota, created her own virtual assistant designed to help with meditating.

A former software engineer and data scientist at companies including Microsoft Corp. and Target Corp., Balter is the founder of Peach Mindfulness, an artificial intelligence conversational platform that acts as a digital coach to help people meditate.

The intelligence system communicates with people via text messaging to determine which forms of meditation are most helpful. For example, when someone feels stressed at work or while with their kids, they can communicate with Peach about their mood, which will deliver or retrieve a meditation for calmness. The system also responds to positive moods, like a promotion at work, Balter said, and would deliver or retrieve meditations for feelings of encouragement or gratitude.

The system also helps build a routine for mediating by sending reminders at a time the user selects. The AI builds on meditations taken the previous day, creating a system of progress to the user.

"We make it as easy and as low stress as we can," Balter said.

The cost to use Peach is $7.99 for a monthly subscription, and $59.99 for an annual one.

Balter bootstrapped the creation of Peach Mindfulness in late 2019, and officially launched the platform in May 2020. Within the first six months, more than 3,000 people signed on to use the St. Paul company's platform, she said.

Of the users of Peach across the country, many cite the COVID-19 pandemic as a major cause of stress, Balter said. People in Minnesota have experienced an extra layer of stress because of the police murder of George Floyd and unrest that followed, she added.

Through a strategic partnership with the Minneapolis Health Department, Peach is being offered free of charge to front-line COVID-19 staffers, Balter said.

She has also offered the platform free of charge to Project Success, a Minneapolis youth organization, and hopes to add more partnerships with government organizations and nonprofits.

"We need a tool to help people feel less stressed, reduce burnout and feel more calm in their life," she said.

The company recently received a grant of just under $30,000 from Launch Minnesota, an initiative through Minnesota's Department of Employment and Economic Development that supports the state's early-stage businesses. The money will be used to reach more users, said Balter, who down the road plans to deploy Peach to Amazon's Alexa virtual assistant and Google Home.

Balter also wants to improve Peach to understand more mental health issues, including trouble sleeping, substance abuse and attention deficit disorders.

"Mental well-being and mental health has always been on my mind because of my personal struggles and things in my life," she said. "With my tech background, I'm bringing tech solutions to help people with mental wellness. That's always been my passion."

Nick Williams • 612-673-4021