Back to the formula.

The first test results are in. They're not the ones we wanted.

Some of it came back well. The protection is broad-spectrum — it covers the full range it's meant to, not just the easy half — and it holds up under sustained light instead of quietly breaking down after an hour on your face. That second one is where a lot of sunscreens fail without anyone noticing. Those parts we keep.

The strength isn't where we need it. Not by a small margin, either. So this version doesn't become a product. It becomes the next one.

In July we wrote that if the results came back short, we'd go back to the formula rather than round up and launch on a hope. That was an easy thing to write while it was hypothetical. We're doing it.

You'll notice there's no number in this post. There won't be one until a certificate says it. Anything we published today would be a work-in-progress figure dressed up as a fact — and that is the precise thing we started 78 Labs to get away from. When the real number exists, it comes here first, whatever it says.

Here's what hasn't changed, and this isn't a brave face. The hard parts of a sunscreen are the spread of the protection, whether it survives real sunlight, and whether it disappears on Indian skin instead of sitting on top of it grey. Those are the ones that kill most attempts. We've got them. What's missing is strength, and strength is the part we know how to work on.

It costs us time. It doesn't cost us conviction.

The waitlist is free and stays free. Nobody has paid us anything, and nobody will until there's something worth paying for. First bottle is ₹499 for the people on it when we open.

— Aashish & Rishitha, 78 Labs