GOQii is a California-based fitness technology venture in Menlo Park that offers a wearable fitness band paired with remote personalized coaching. The company was founded by Vishal Gondal, the former CEO & Founder of Indiagames. After closing its beta Beta program in April 2014, GOQii became commercially available in India in August 2014.
The company also has offices in Mumbai, India and Shenzhen, China and plans to expand its services to the Middle East, the United States, and Singapore.
The company has been running beta in the United States of America for the last few months and has now commenced commercial operations in April 2016.
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History
After selling his former startup, Indiagames to Disney in 2011 for approximately $100M, Vishal Gondal founded GOQii, a one on one mobile coaching and fitness tracking service. The idea for GOQii developed when he noticed that he wasn't simply using the devices exclusively, but also sharing the collected data with a personal trainer who would then provide him with customized advice.
The company embarked on a beta program with 1000 subscribers in early 2014 before launching commercially in India in August.
In January 2015, the company launched a limited US beta only open to 500 initial customers in the U.S. Selected applicants receive 12 months of personal training through unlimited chat and monthly video calls over the company's mobile app, along with a free wearable device.
Personal Trainer Menlo Park Video
Service Model
GOQii offers a wearable fitness band which collects users' (called players) activity and sleep data. A personal coach is assigned to a player who reviews this data and communicates via mobile app to guide them towards their health and fitness goals. A player pays a subscription fee for personalized coaching with a wearable device, which has an OLED display and hum vibration module, tracks steps, distance, time, calories, active time, and sleep.
App and coaching system
GOQii players are connected to a team of coaches via the GOQii app. Members of the coaching team analyze the data the fitness tracker collects to help users make "sustainable and incremental changes" towards a more active lifestyle. Every coach has a background in personal fitness, nutrition, and cognitive behavioral therapy and is responsible for coaching between 100 and 150 users. The coaching plan includes pre-scheduled monthly calls, real-time chats, and daily texting. The GOQii companion app allows users to share their stats on social media and tracks Karma points. The app also supports a Hi-5 feature wherein a coach can congratulate a user for being on track.
GOQii Doctor and Health Locker
On August 4, 2016, in partnership with Thyrocare and Max Healthcare, GOQii launched its new version, which included a personal Health Locker and a lifestyle doctor (called the GOQii Doctor), who is a qualified physician (MBBS/MD) and will be available on the GOQii platform for medical consultation. A GOQii doctor is responsible for analyzing the medical history of a player and work with the personal coach to design the right routine that ensures the best results for a healthy body and a positive mindset. In addition, a player can also take a 'Health Risk Assessment' test and get their 'Health Score' via the app.
The Health Locker feature allows a user to keep all their health records in one place in an organized manner and have access to them online through the app. Its diagnostics feature allows users to book tests, take them from home and get results directly into their Health Locker.
Karma points
Players earn Karma points when they meet their daily goals; for every 390 steps, GOQii "players" earn one karma point. They can use these points, which third party donors match in dollars, to donate to their chosen charity. GOQii has partnered with Oxfam India to facilitate this process. Through the GOQii app, donors can select how much they wish to donate to a certain cause.
Key People
Founded by Vishal Gondal, the board of directors includes Bala Deshpande, Alex Yao of Cheetah Mobile and Pravin Gandhi. In April 2016, Amit Singhal of Google joined as one of the board of directors.
The company has raised funding from Angel Investors including Amit Singhal of Google, Neeraj Arora of WhatsApp, Marco Argenti of Amazon Web Services Mobile, Anil Godhwani of Habitera, Steve Luczo of Seagate, Mike McNamara of Flextronics, Kanwaljit Bombra of Dell, Vijay Vashee of Microsoft, Bollywood actress Madhuri Dixit Nene and Dr. Shriram Nene.
Funding and Strategic Partnerships
GOQii received $13.4 million in Series A funding led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and Cheetah Mobile Inc. with additional support from Great Wall Club (GWC), DSG Consumer Partners, Ilkka Paananen and Pravin Gandhi in November 2015.
Financial services firm Edelweiss has entered a strategic partnership with GOQii and closed an investment round in early 2016. GOQii tied up with Axis Bank to collaborate on wearable devices for its customers offering them the fitness service and allowing them to make NFC payments from the device later in 2016.
On April 20, 2017, Max Bupa Health Insurance announced a three way tie-up with GOQii and global reinsurance company Swiss Re to provide health and wellness offerings. With the emphasis placed by The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) on driving the shift from 'illness to wellness', the offerings will cater to the preventive health care needs of consumers. GOQii's personalized wellness engine, equipped with solutions such as health coaching and health management tools would be offered under this tie-up along with Swiss Re's technical assistance in creating relevant products and expertise to create risk assessment models for the future.
Harvard Case Study
In April 2017, GOQii became the third Indian startup after Flipkart and Paytm to be featured as a case study on the famed Harvard Business Publishing Platform, a subsidiary of Harvard University that brings out books, magazines and leadership studies for MBA students. Through the GOQii case study, students will obtain lessons on Artificial Intelligence, Entrepreneurship, Healthcare and Technology.
GOQii Sanjeevani
On World Health Day 2017, GOQii introduced Sanjeevani, a first ever initiative to expand its preventive health and wellness ecosystem to a wider audience with integration into public health care. The pilot project was launched on April 7, 2017 in the villages of Vaghadi and Charoti in the Palghar District of Maharashtra which has a combined population of over 2000. For the pilot project, GOQii worked closely with Member of Parliament, Poonam Mahajan, who has adopted the villages under Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi's, Adopt a Village Scheme - 'Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana' to convert the villages into a model village. GOQii also aims to address issues such as anemia, malnutrition, women's health and diseases predominant in rural India.
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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