Tom Brady joins massage-robot startup Aescape as CIO

Tom Brady spent 23 seasons dodging sacks, swearing off tomatoes, and stretching the definition of pliability. Now, the NFL’s most famous longevity experiment is handing his recovery playbook to a new set of teammates: robots.

On Tuesday, Brady was named the chief innovation officer of Aescape , a New York-based startup that builds AI-powered massage tables. The company has secured exclusive rights to his training and recovery protocols — the same TB12 routines Brady says helped him last in the league getting hit by 300-pound linemen until age 45 — and will weave them into the company’s customizable, sensor-driven platform. The press release’s tagline? “Built by Brady, backed by science.”

“I want to try to make [the care I received] available for everybody,” Brady told CNBC , crediting daily and weekly bodywork for keeping him in one piece long enough to win seven Super Bowls. “There’s no way I could have accomplished what I did professionally without all the massage work and recovery protocols.”

As CIO, Brady will translate the TB12 routines into machine-delivered, co-developed protocols aimed at improving mobility, boosting performance, and reducing injury risk. Neither Brady nor Aescape disclosed the terms of the deal.

Aescape’s pitch is that it can scale elite recovery in ways humans can’t. Its robotic tables use sensors to create a 3D map of the body, apply consistent pressure, and adjust settings for each session — theoretically: no tired hands, no small talk. (And no risk of winding up in an NFL disciplinary report.) The company has already raised more than $130 million from investors, including an $83 million round led by Valor Equity Partners earlier this year; installed its tables in more than 100 locations across Equinox gyms and select Four Seasons, Marriott, and Ritz-Carlton hotels; and delivered over 25,000 massages. Prices for a massage start around $30.

Robotic massage has been around in different guises for years, usually closer to a novelty than a necessity. But wellness has been steadily rebranded as infrastructure, and Aescape is pitching something more ambitious: data tracking and the science of self-care.

Brady’s longtime business partner, Alex Spiro, is also joining Aescape as a strategic advisor, helping steer capital markets strategy as the company looks to expand into corporate wellness programs, professional sports facilities, and (eventually) homes. For a company chasing scale, imprinting Brady’s protocols is a shortcut to credibility — and potentially to contracts in locker rooms that still treat massage tables like offensive linemen: as essential infrastructure.

This isn’t Brady’s first post-football venture. He has a clothing line, a media company, a color commentary gig, and slices of team ownership (the Las Vegas Raiders and the Las Vegas Aces). But this move feels particularly on-brand. Unlike tequila labels or celebrity sneakers, a recovery-robot partnership lines up neatly with Brady’s image as football’s most disciplined body experiment.

He outlasted most of his peers and more than a few iPhone models, Buc’ing quarterback mortality. He deflated defenses and endured Deflategate — and now he’s aiming to deflate stress. For two decades, the only robot in Brady’s life was Bill Belichick. Now, Brady is teaming up with one that actually admits it’s a machine.