London-based health startup Yomp, formerly known as PleaseCycle, has raised $315,000 (£200,000) from five angel investors, to expand its heath and wellness platform which ‘games’ company employees into healthy habits.
Yomp’s platform is designed to encourage physical activity amongst a company’s employees, helping to increase productivity, reduce absenteeism and make you like your bosses (ok, maybe not that last bit).
A mobile app logs trips, tracks stats, lets you form teams, set goals and earn points – like an AirMiles for being healthy. These are then used to get online discounts, win prizes, or give donations to charity.
Companies signed up to use the app include Dentsu Aegis Media, Bloomberg and EDF Energy, with the former deploying it in nine countries.
Ry Morgan, Yomp’s 26 year-old Founding CEO, says, “We’ve built everything to-date on a shoestring and retained profits, but we’re now at a stage where an influx of capital will help drive the business forward.”
Competitors to Yomp include the incumbent in the space, Global Corporate Challenge, Keas (ex-Google founders with huge growth), EveryMove, GetHealth, Maxwell Health (bigger remit but similar budgets) and Challenge for Change / Love2Ride .
The QS companies are also starting to explore the B2B space, such as Jawbone’s recent launch of “Up for Groups”.
Traditional employee-benefit and healthcare providers are also in this space too, although they’re lagging behind, such as PruHealth’s Vitality.