GOQii

Recently, i came across a US based fitness tracking app called GOQii, which is rapidly expanding in China and India. It combines a wearable technology (own wristband) with an accompanying app and a personal instructor who structures a fitness regime for each individual subscriber and follows up on it through chats, telephone calls and v-con.

What is great though, is that the service and app is also compatible with competing wearable fitness technology devices like Fitbit, Jawbone and Misfit; so it effectively takes the hardware out of the equation, and encourages adoption by a greater number of people.

More importantly, GOQii is taking a shot at the most common problem faced by fitness apps worldwide, that after some amount of use by new enthusiasts, they are abandoned, that most people lose interest eventually. They are trying to get around this by doing two things:

1. Charging money (3 month subscription: Rs 3,999; 6 month: Rs 6,999; 12 month: Rs 11,999) so you might feel compelled to utilize the package which you have paid for without dropping out i.e. in Indian terms: "paisa vasool karna" (similar to a gym membership)
2. Providing a coach who will push, motivate and guide you (at a much cheaper rate than a personal trainer at the gym or outside)

Some gaps and challenges are still abound:

1. Need: For a fitness oriented person, who is driven and dedicated enough, the push, motivation and guidance of a personal trainer is immaterial, hence one may just use a free app like Strava, Runkeeper or Nike+  to track activities
2. Community: A major motivation factor for me, within Strava, is the community. The ability to follow rides and runs of friends and relatives, to like and comment, and interact with others within the app (similar to a Facebook feed, but for fitness) The GOQii community is currently an unknown factor
3. Portability: Having used Strava for the last three years, my history of activities and total kms run and cycled is a major moat which prevents me from switching to another app. If GOQii were to allow its import to their app, and sync activity history and usage between various apps, they would also take the moat out of the equation; while at the same time providing their personal coaches with a database of fitness history, much like providing a medical history to a new doctor
4. Marketplace and Network Effects: Apart from offering their own fitness trainers (who provide assurance of service quality) GOQii has also pivoted into a marketplace for trainers, where trainers need to be certified by GOQii before offering their services to subscribers. Alternately, it could gradually move to any user uploading their training routine, for others to follow, with the possibility of being rated by user feedback or number of followers. Charges could be pre-defined or auctioned, much like an an Uber for fitness, with GOQii purely being a medium for connecting fitness oriented folks, and retaining a part of the fees as their margin, and looking at alternate sources of income like advertising for fitness related apparel and accessories.

In conclusion, our lifestyle nowadays involves long periods of physical inactivity during the day, positioned at a laptop or a desktop, coupled with unhealthy eating habits, and elevated levels of stress on an everyday basis. I am a big proponent of allocating some time everyday for physical activity, either before or after work, be it something as simple as a half an hour walk in the nearby park.

It is really nice to see the technology and internet oriented support, apps and communities mushrooming around fitness, and catering to the growing mass of newbies and athletes alike, on their path towards a long term healthy routine and lifestyle.

References and additional information:

1. GOQii recently secured some funding, and here is a complete review of the product and service itself by the good folks at NDTV Gadgets
2. More on network effects here and here, by Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures. I am a fan of his investment philosophy, and if such opportunities were to emerge for a retail investor in India, i would go long on these scrips
3. I have used Strava for tracking my runs and rides over the last 3 years, and my Strava profile can be found here. It has been with me through 4 half marathons over this period, and through the ongoing preparation for a full marathon early next year

Pushing The Limits

After a three month monsoon break and a dislocated finger, and on barely three hours of sleep, i din't think doing a 40 km ride was physically possible, but we did it. Okay, so we've done longer rides before. We've been all the way to Borivali, Vashi (both 50k) and Thane (62k), and even climbed Malabar Hill thrice on a single ride. Okay, we had a pretty long break at our destination waiting for the rain to stop, before riding back. But, much to my amazement, even after deciding the return journey was beyond us on just the first day back in the saddle, after trying to get back by train (and failing miserably due to the crowd) and after promising to go easy on the pace, we still rode back in record time.

For much of the return journey, i was in the the zone. Head down, pedals kicking over as if driven by a mechanized motor, kilometers flying by. The zone, that amazing period of time when its mind over matter, pain is taken out of the equation, and all that is visible is the destination. When you don't realize how far you've come until you sit back and take a look behind, and when you take a moment to think about it, you can't quite come up with how you achieved it.

Which got me thinking.. are we really pushing the limits in our everyday life? Have we really explored how far we can be stretched? If we think about any of our past achievements, can we say beforehand that we had it in us, and the result was guaranteed? Isn't each milestone a new discovery of having been stretched beyond the limits we thought we were capable of, and setting a new benchmark for ourselves?

Loads of questions. Loads of unknowns.

PS. For those unfamiliar with the geography of this beautiful metropolis of Mumbai, a nice map can be found here.

I map my rides using an amazing app called Strava, a running and cycling GPS tracking app that automatically maps your rides, and provides analytics for speed, elevation and comparison against other online athletes.

Also, a photo of the beautiful Gokuldham abode of Lord Krsna from today morning. 

Hope you all had a safe and pleasant Janmashtami celebration couple of days back. Until next time, Jai Shri Krsna!