Simon Sollberger & Rich Bayly - PEAR Health Labs: Building the Operating System for Population Wellness

Hey friends, welcome to the Future of Fitness, a top-rated fitness and wellness industry podcast for over five years and running. I'm your host, Eric Malzone, and I have the honor of talking to entrepreneurs, innovators, and cutting-edge technology experts within the extremely fast-paced industries of fitness, wellness, and health sciences. If you like the show, we'd love it if you took three minutes of your day to leave us a nice supporter review wherever you consume your podcast. If you're interested in staying up to date with the future of fitness, go to futurofitness.co to subscribe and get weekly summaries dropped into your inbox. Now on to the show. One theme keeps coming up: the right technology can make or break your business. That's why I'm thrilled to introduce our new presenting sponsor, Perfect Gym. Perfect Gym isn't just another gym management system. They are part of the Sport Alliance Group, Europe's leading fitness software company that has officially entered the US market. Now, I've seen this movie before, but here's the difference. They've opened up a U.S. headquarters in Boston because they understand that the American market deserves dedicated, localized support. After digging into the platform, one benefit especially stood out. They are simplifying the nightmare that keeps business owners up at night migrations. These guys were able to migrate one mega client with more than 250 locations in six different countries in just 20 days between two payment runs. No disrupting operations, no member loss, one seamless operation that simply works. Now, if you have ever switched platforms, you know how terrifying that process can be and how truly impressive that feat is. At a high level, here's their secret sauce. They give the power back to the operator. Instead of forcing you into their closed ecosystem, their Perfect Gym Marketplace connects with over 120 integration partners. So want to use your own app, your preferred payment processor, class pass for booking? No problem. Whether you're running a single studio or managing a multi-location enterprise, Perfect Gym was built from the ground up for multi-club operations. They've invested a ton into this platform, and now they're bringing that European engineering excellence to America. The migration experts have arrived. Check out perfectgym.com where enterprise level sophistication meets operator freedom. Today's episode of the Future Fitness is brought to you by Flex, the only HSA FSA payments infrastructure built specifically for leading fitness and wellness brands. I have been so impressed with the Flex team and their vision to transform how people pay for fitness. They built a platform that makes HSA and FSA spending seamless, unlocking a new revenue stream for brands and giving consumers easier access to the products and services that keep them healthy. Here's why Fitz matters. Flex helps fitness brands increase average order value by up to 50% and boost checkout conversion by 30%. That is not just incremental growth, that is transformational revenue powered by consumer dollars that are already set aside for health and wellness. What excites me the most is that Flex is changing the game for the entire industry. They're bridging the gap between healthcare and fitness by making it simple for consumers to spend their pre-tax dollars on the products and services that help them feel and perform their best. Flex works with fitness leaders like iFit, Johnson Fitness, Tempo, and Aloe Moves. Honestly, this is a no-brainer, and I rarely say that. If you want to see how Flex can drive growth for your fitness brand, visit withflex.com. That is with Flex.com. Now onto the show. Simon Solberger and Rich Bailey. Welcome to the future of fitness. Simon, welcome back. Richard, welcome for the first time. Uh it's really good to see you guys. How's it going?

Thanks for having us.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, Simon, I'm I'm excited. You know, you and I did an interview, I think it was like five, six years ago, five or six years ago. And I actually still quote a lot of things that you said during that interview in very good ways. Like I remember you had a really good analogy about the uh was it the red box? Kind of like I think it was your kid or whatever clients' kids try to swipe one of those DVD rental things, and that was to set the table for like consumer technology expectations of the youth as it increases. So anyway, if people here have heard me use that before, it's Simon. You I gotta credit him. Use it freely. You guys have been doing okay, so you guys have been doing an awful lot. There's a lot of, as you guys self-described, a lot of tentacles to pair health and everything you're doing, the you know, acquiring of aptive and the AI solutions that you guys providing, but also you have a you guys have a really nice intersection of deep coaching and practitioner knowledge and technology, which I think is very interesting for leading this industry into the future. So, Simon, you've already been on the show. I'm gonna start with Rich. If you don't mind, Rich, uh give us a quick introduction who you are, and then we'll uh we'll take it from there.

Yeah, thanks, Eric. And uh great to be here. Look, my name Rich is Rich Bailey. Uh, my role up here is to deliver on our product strategy. And so my focus area is our deep tech. So that's our AI and foundational IP. And we want to use that to deliver on our core belief that exercise is medicine. And so when we think about our technology and AI and our IP, we want to see that as an amplifier that helps that medicine reach more people more effectively. And so, in my role and working with Simon, it's about how do we translate that complex technology into simple, hyper-personalized experiences that deliver, allow us to deliver on our mission to empower people to move smarter, live healthier, healthier, and happier lives.

Yeah. Awesome. Thanks for that, Rich. And uh, I think, you know, as we get into this, your background will start to come to the front because you've been you've been coaching and being involved in sports and athletics and performance for a very long time. And I think, you know, what what we're probably gonna talk about, I would imagine, I never really know until we get done with the conversation, but like hyper-personalization, out of all the events I went to this year, as far as industry events, there was a couple things that took front and center, right? Hyperpersonalization, AI was right along it, alongside, or maybe I should say hyper-personalization is right alongside artificial intelligence. And so people are keen on on doing that. They want to they want to get out in front of it, start adopting it into their practices and going from there. So I'm gonna go back to you, man. It's been five years, roughly, give or take, since uh you came on this show and you joined me with for your prolific quotes. But what's what's been going on, man? Like what's what's new, what's changed?

Yeah, it's been it's been frothy, right? Like it's so much happened since. The one thing that's it's it's good and and also frustrating, right? Like our vision still holds very much true, right? We really want to kind of shift from kind of what we call dumb fitness to smart fitness, right? So to really have a coaching partner that knows who you are and what's right for you and what to do, when to do it. So and so we've obviously been working on this for a long time, as you know, and we've been kind of you know making small progress. And obviously, one big one was acquiring performance labs, which Rich is obviously part of the New Zealand team, which is kind of our science slash AI arm, right? Our science team, AI team is in New Zealand. And so that really obviously gave a huge intelligence boost to our platform, right? Where we can truly interpret it, you know, who somebody is, what they are doing, what they should be doing. And so we can really curate dynamically the content that's right for the person. So again, I think the vision is still the same, right? Making smart, interactive coaching, but that's just getting better and better. And so so that was obviously one acquisition, bringing performance labs in to add intelligence, make the system smarter, more adaptive. So we're way on our way to that. And as you know, the the latest acquisition we did was Active, right? And that was kind of in the light of we really saw the shift, right, from from kind of just in the in the health industry, we saw this shift from from care and treatment to to prevention and lifestyle, right? And so in the past, you would have somebody like you know, like some health insurance company build their own apps, and they were always very drab and clinical and boring. And so what we saw was really the shift to consumer grade experiences. So Aptive is one of the most beloved and downloaded fitness apps, and so we really wanted to accelerate that process to a consumer grade experience, and hence we we teamed up with you know, brought Aptive on board and you know, kind of accelerated that shift to to a higher grade consumer experience.

Awesome. And when was that? When did you guys do the uh the partnership or acquisition with Aptive?

Uh Aptive was about two years ago.

Okay. Got it, got it. Yeah, you know, it reminds me, I'm here, I guess as I'm talking to you guys, I'm realizing how much I just regurgitate other people's quotes and words, but Steven Webster was in a conversation with him from Ascensi, and he uh was talking about like how there's some critical points in technology, and one of them which, if people are old enough uh to remember, uh what was the what was the thing before the iPhone? The uh would had it was mostly used for work. Blackberry?

Yeah, the Blackberry.

Blackberry, thank you. Jeez, the Blackberry, right? And how like everyone had a Blackberry for work, and all of a sudden the iPhone came out, and everyone was like going to their IT department and saying, like, hey, can you just you know crack open this so I can use my iPhone just solely? Or you know, they had two things walking around, and then the business world started to come in and be like, Yeah, well, we need these consumer level experiences for the workplace, right? So it's like that was like when I think of what you're talking about, that's I that's an example that really comes to mind.

That's a great example, and also that the consumer pull, right? The consumer pulls in what they want. And so yeah, I think that's a great example, right? Yeah, like people, even for corporate wellness, you don't want an experience that's branded by your health insurance, you want the consumer great experience, right?

So it yeah, totally consumer great experience. I like that. Well, maybe uh if you guys want to do this, I always find the easiest way to explain what something is is maybe going through the consumer experience. So, you know, with aptive, you know, there's there's a lot of words in there that people, you know, the corporate wellness or consumer wellness and applications and a healthy lifestyle, things like that. But what describe aptive from the point of the consumer? Like what is the experience and what's some of the technology that you guys have layered in there? Whoever wants to take it. How are you, Rich?

Yeah, happy, happy, happy to take that. For us, um, aptive is an intelligent wellness platform. So that allows users to come in, they can build their own program based on their preferences, based on their experience level, based on the workouts and timing that they want to do. They can build that program, they can execute that on a daily basis. They can come in and find additional supplementary content that supports them on their activity journey, you know, whether that's around nutrition, breath work, meditation. And so that we're able to provide a myriad of options for the users to be able to perform as they go through their own personal activity journey. And so, you know, that's important to them. We've also got access to a gym network of over 30,000 gyms. So this allows us to be able to provide a holistic wellness experience for our users that takes into account both the digital experience, whether that's at home or the gym, and then also a physical experience and in uh across a broad gym network that operates coast to coast.

Yeah, really think of us as kind of the evolution of the fitness app, right? Like so the old school fitness app would just be like you have to go and find something for you, you know, find a run or whatever, you know, strength and strengths exercise, and you just kind of get a video or audio and you do it. And so the evolution, so Active is really the evolution of that into something more much more holistic. Like Richard said, it's it's just not just like workouts, but it's like breath work, it's mobility health. And now relayering in smart tools, right? So we have a uh mobility assessment tool that actually can assess you know how well you move and then identifies deficiencies and then programs towards that, right? So this could be you know to prevent injury or just to keep you healthy moving, right? And so, yeah, so think of it as a smart population wellness platform. And when we say population, that could be corporate wellness, could be first responders, could be the DOD, right? So we have several contracts with the Air Force, but yeah, smart population wellness as a platform is a good way to kind of characterize that.

So, you know, I think there's we all know in the industry there's a ton of value to providing like the guidance and the knowledge and the kind of the steps to get people to where they are, especially if it's personalized. If you if you do some of the sort of assessment, if I do an assessment on, you know, aptive and it, you know, I I haven't used it, so we're just kind of winging it here. But you know, it tells me like, okay, um, you know, I have left angle poor mobility in my left ankle, which affects my right hip. Maybe there's some other assessments that go in, like, you know, uh realize like I just need to meditate more, my blood pressure is high, you know, kind of stuff that's that's fairly normal for a guy my age, I guess. Knowing it is one thing, but like getting me to engage in it is a completely different thing, right? Like you could have everything, every answer you possibly need to be a healthier, more viable human being, right? But you got to do it. And that's like, I think even with people in the like for even for me, it's hard for me to get up and do my mobility every morning. I know I'm supposed to be doing it, but I don't want to do it. So, like, how do you get people more engaged? Like, are we showing progress through technology and actually the engagement levels with with these types of programs?

Yeah. So one of the things we're looking at is and really understanding is the intersection between or interplay between physical activity and behavior change. And I guess the the paradox there is to be able to create behavior change from a physical activity point of view. Don't focus on the physical activity, focus on the the mental side and the behavior change side. And so this is about meeting the user where they are on their journey, understanding that each user has a different starting point and a different goal. And so what works for one group of users is not going to work for another group of users. So, how do we how do we use some of our technology to be able to understand, hey, where a user is at and what is the the nudge that we want to provide them to move them to do the next best thing for them? So if that's hey, you you're not doing anything, how can we give them a small nudge to start doing something? Is that hey, we start with just doing this this breath work or this meditation, starting easy and allowing them to feel the the power of small wins, winning the day. And so if we can focus on that and get them feeling like they're winning, that is what we believe is going to help create that behavior change and that habit over time.

Yeah, no, the New Zealand team did a lot of really a little legwork on on this, right? Like how do you move somebody into a habit and into the action phase, right? So if you before, you know, and that's again, I'm referencing a lot of kind of old school fitness app, which is be like, hey, you know, you have a rigid training plan, and Thursday, you do this workout, right? And that's just not quite how how humans operate, right? Because always things always change or you might not feel like it. Or so we really want to shift kind of away from from hard, you know, rigid prescription to to more what we call a guided kind of guided discovery. And also, how do you get somebody into habit, right? Before actually get to the action phase, you need to kind of plant the seed, right? Like so gifts, you know, and this could be what we call soft content. This could be a podcast or an article or just a little prompt, right? But so the the user kind of gets to start thinking about what they could be doing, right? I've never done mobility work in my life. So first I need to kind of know what this is about and why and what the benefits are. So yeah, again, planting seeds to then get people into the action phase.

So soft uh so podcasts are soft content. Is that every time?

It's an amazing reader, right? I don't know why that's alarming time people spend on podcasts, right? Like it's it's crazy. So we want to leverage that.

Yeah, I know I get it. Okay, it's just I've never thought about it that way.

But also linking it to action, right? Like, so I'm in, you know, I'm in my car, I commute, I listen to one of your podcasts, and after that podcast, my automation is probably at peak, right? Because I just listened to why mobility is so amazing, right? And so how can we link that motivation and information to then action, right? So there's there's definitely kind of a a missing link from from what you do to then the actual action fees. So I think there's a big opportunity.

That's the billion-dollar, maybe trillion dollar question, right? Yeah, go ahead, Rachel.

I was gonna say in our context, you know, we can see that as a form of coaching. And coaching is not just hey, you need to have a tighter core or or or drop deeper in a squat. You know, that that is one form of coaching. I think the other coaching is, you know, how do we help provide the user the right information at the right time for them to be able to make a subtle shift in their behavior? And so as Simon's referencing on the soft content, how are we using that to make subtle suggestions in order to be able to, as he as Simon says, plan to see to be able to go, hey, I'm gonna shift how I might interact with my next my next decision and and actually have a positive outcome in terms of my behavior change.

I like it. Let's take it one layer deeper as far as context and maybe get into the um what you guys do with the Air Force. Because I think that'll provide, you know, kind of because you know, you you guys have so many applications across numerous, you know, populations and and groups. But tell us about that one, like how, because I know it's more of a specific case. So maybe walk us through how that worked and how you guys work with the the DOD in that case.

Yeah, sure. So so we've we've embarked on a number of projects with the US Air Force, understanding how we can use our technology and our knowledge to be able to help the S female service members be able to prepare for childbirth through their pregnancy and then also come out the other side in the postpartum phase and be able to repair and recover. And so that they can get ready to be able to pass their their 12-month PFT. So when we think about that, you know, that that really aligns with our our goals and our mission, allowing people to move smarter, live happier, healthier lives. If we can apply that in that context, then we can see that we can have a really positive outcome on not only individual people's lives, but on an institution at a larger scale. And so when we think about AI in this context, it's not necessarily about artificial intelligence. For us, it's about how do we amplify impact. So the other AI amplifying impact. And so it's not about the technology for its own sake, but it's a how do we use that as a tool to deliver on our mission that movement is medicine. So we've been able to work with subject matter experts to be able to develop human-curated training programs that allow a user to interact with aptive, go through a series of questions and assessments, to be able to build them a program that guides them through each phase of their journey, whether it's prenatal or postpartum. And then in the moment, in the day, be able to check in using what we call natural language, using um aptive to be able to interact with the with the coach and then be able to adapt their program. So if they're not feeling great, why is that? How do we help them still do something, win the day and keep moving and be able to almost provide that coaching in the moment? So it's not a a binary outcome of hey, I trained or I didn't. It's actually I have done something today and I've won the day and I've moved on and I'm moving closer towards my goal. So you really harnessing those power of small stuff.

I like it. So maybe like if I'm private penny, right? I'm about to have I'm pregnant, about to have a my first kid. How does it how does it all start? Is it like they get sent access to an app and then you do an onboarding, you talk to a coach, or is it automated? Like what does that actually feel and look like in that initial processes?

Yeah. So so if you were private penny, for example, we want to be able to, you you would be given access to the Fitwarm tenant on aptitude, and you would go through the process of setting up an account and onboarding. We would then allow you to be able to interact with our AI coach, to be able to answer some questions that are pertinent to um your particular situation. So in this case, on prenatal, we would ask some questions, and based on those answers, we've developed a series of programs that are, as I say, human curated. So it's not giving all the power and the decision over to the the technology. It's actually understanding how do we use the human to be able to make the decision and develop a programming schedule to be able to deliver the user and guide them on their journey. And then In the moment, you know, in the day today, as they're un as they're going through life, they're able to check in with this coach and be able to get an adaption on their plan based on how they're feeling. Hey, are they feeling strong and we're ready to go? Are they feeling a little a little bit mere today? Not quite ready to hit it, but I still want to move. Or is it just a day where life's getting the better of me, better of me? And I just need to calm my central nervous system. I just do some breath work. But hey, I'm still doing an activity and feeling like I'm making progress by acting. And so we want to be able to provide the opportunity for users to be able to have that autonomy, but also be guided with the discovery of the activity that they're doing in the moment.

And I think the notion of a holistic programming, right? We see it as just we've seen it very much in, you know, in the military, but also as firefighters. And we saw it very clearly when we worked with the German Soccer Federation, right? Actually, the word that I heard the most was player welfare. And what really what this is about is like up till recently it was just all about performance, right? And so that's really what we're working on to you know to bring this holistic programming to the table.

And I presume you guys are you guys as far as data, well, is it subjective? Do you have objective? Like you're connecting with wearables or any other kind of data flowing in that's personalized to each particular individual. Or yeah, what how what kind of data are you guys getting on these people?

Yeah, so so we're using a combination of both sensor data and also subjective feedback from the user. So being able to take those two elements and being able to use that to create a decision point to be able to provide back to the user to say, hey, based on X, Y, and Z, we think that this is the next best thing that you could be doing. And so we we go through that process. We also realize that humans are not robots. We want to be able to provide the user still with the ability to have the autonomy to make a choice. And so whilst we can make recommendations, I think it's important that the user still has the autonomy to be able to say, hey, that may be what we've done or what is recommended, but I still want to be able to choose to do something else. So again, guidance, some coaching, but not really restrictive in terms of this is what you have to do. And then in terms of the tools that we're using, the the data that we're pulling in, we're increasing the number of platforms that we're we're able to pull that from as well. So what that means for us and for the end users is that more data points means more personalization. And so for us, it's an evolution. We can continue to provide that hyper-personalized recommendation of what I should do next. But it's based on not only what are they doing in the one by seven, the one hour of training, 30 minutes of training they may be doing a day, it's the 23 by seven. What happens outside the gym? What happens outside the workout that is impacting your ability to recover, to be able to absorb what you've done, your life load, are you sleeping well? What's your what's happening to your HRV? All of those things that will have an impact on that recommendation to be able to guide that user. Yeah, awesome.

It's really a brain, right? Like obviously the most obvious is biometric data from a wearable. Yes, we ingest all that. Connected scales, yes, we we ingest that. A glucose meter, that's going to be next, right? But also there's, for example, for mobility, it's pretty simple, right? Like we tried, we played around with some computer vision stuff, but more often than not, it's confusing to a user and to have to set up if you prop up your phone and things like that. What we do, and we're partnering with obviously some experts in this field, like mover, but it gives you just a handful of things like how deep can you go in your squat and how high can you raise your hands above your head during a squat, or how far down can you can you touch your toes, or is it just to your chin? So chin. So that that then informs the system on T markers for mobility and informs the programming. So yeah, it's a range. It's parametric wearables, it's uh you know, simple, self-reported, and it and even just like what do you, you know, what piques your interest, right? It's it's like it's almost like an Instagram, right? What do you like or what do you hover on that tells the system what your preferences are or what you're interested in? So it's really a range of data in that in that regard.

You know, we I want to kind of focus on the AI component of it. I mean, it's I think I'm starting to get a little AI fatigue of tiring talking about it, but it's it's just it's what you gotta do, right? It's everywhere. And you guys have some really nice terms that you use and tools that and way you're applying it, which I think provide more um clarity. You know, like you you described AI as connective tissue for for the application, the technology, and the the service you guys provide. Also, there you had a really interesting um feature, I guess it'll be this term of like the future self. So visualization as a motivation tool. So maybe give us some idea, like in through how how do you look at AI? I mean, obviously it's not AI is not a standalone technology anymore, right? It's just everything has AI, right? So it's just this universal catch-all tool of phrase. So yeah, and maybe give us some clarity on like how you guys are specifically using artificial intelligence in the app.

Yeah. Simon, I'll uh give this a I'll go with this and feel free to talent.

Yeah, go go for it.

Yeah. So so you know, as I as I mentioned, you know, as you've mentioned, sorry, that there's a lot of hype around AI. And and I think it's easy, easy to get caught up in the that whirlwind of everything has to be AI and we're gonna AI this, AI that. And it's a very, very exciting time. And what that means with this new technology is that you can provide a solution and experience for everything. What we're finding is that taking a step back and I just as I said earlier, understanding what is our purpose and mission, and then how do we how do we use that tool to amplify that impact? So not using the technology for the technology's sake, but using the technology to have a make a difference to the user's life and actually deliver on our on our belief that movement is is medicine. So I think it's been very selective around how you use the tool and using it to be able to guide the user, as as Simon's used the term, is using it as the connective tissue between each interaction, providing the coaching, providing the feedback for the user to guide them. You know, you touched on this this future self idea with the ability to be able to understand now what are a user's goals, where are they at currently, and then what is their what is their future state look like? How do we use technology to be able to present that future state back to them today? And so using tools like Google's Imagine, being able to generate a photo of them and go, hey, if you did this, this is what you're gonna look like today. This is what you're gonna look like in the future today. And so it brings that future state immediately to them and provides a lot more motivation and makes that more real. And I think if you're hit you've got a vision and you can clearly see that, that is empowering for your motivation and for your action. And so being able to use some of these tools to be helped to really supercharge the motivation and feedback that we're providing users as they go on their journey.

Yeah, and it's you know, like you said, there's AI fatigue, as you said, it's just very frothy, right? There's so much hype, and so we want to be very thoughtful and not just do something because we can, but truly look through the lens of the user experience and make it meaningful. And so actually, one of the things we choke internally is like AI can't just be a text entry box with a blinking cursor, right? Because that's how all these models currently work, and that's obviously not very compelling. So, what what what kind of product layer can we put on top of AI? And the most compelling is obviously the natural language interface, right? For the first time ever, you can actually have a dialogue or have a dialogue, you know, so it's back and forth, right? So we that's that's what we want to lean into, right? So you can actually tell our system how you feel, or you what gear you just bought, or hey, I'm traveling, I'm on a business trip, and so that obviously then shifts what kind of content you get. So that's that's definitely the where the opportunities are. The other thing is we just played around is we can now create content that's very responsive to the user, right? So traditionally fitness content is pretty pretty bland, right? It's like a white seamless and a black mat and some some dude in shorts. But let's say we we create content now for a fire department. So now we can create content very quickly that's generative AI in front of a fire station, and the age and the demographic and you know is appropriate and the tone of the coaching is appropriate. Or same if you do content for a youth soccer team in Singapore, you know, it's it's the it's the age, it's the gender, it's the environment. So we can actually create that very quickly. And that that's exciting, right? So we can refresh content very quickly, and we can make it in context of who it is for. Yeah. So there's to us that's the kind of the compelling area of AI. The other thing is trust, right? We don't just want to give an AI model, but we combine it with, as you recall, kind of at the core of pair was what we call training intelligence, which is basically an evidence-based system that ensures you know you get the right content for you. So we obviously combine AI with that kind of science layer of training intelligence to make sure it is this is trusted. What do you get is you know, not just some hallucination of an AI, but there's some scientific rigor behind it.

Out of curiosity, are you guys looking at augmented reality? I mean, do you think that's going to be a real thing in the near future, or is that kind of still a little fringy? Depends for what. I mean, sure. I mean for for health, for fitness and wellness, I guess. Yeah.

There's some really um and that's probably not quite our our turf, but uh we've seen some very compelling use cases for PTSD, like some VR and augmented reality can be really compelling for some certain therapeutic applications. I think the complete VR is obviously challenging because here you don't have the context of what's around you. Yeah, I mean, again, is it is it easy and does it fit easily into your lifestyle? Maybe not, but I'm I'm sure there's there's definitely compelling application uh specific application cases. But yeah, not quite our returns or focus at this point.

Yeah, I think I think it's a very exciting technology and um it has lots of use cases. I from my perspective, I sort of look at it as you know if we're trying to have a big impact on on users and ultimately make people healthier, we should allow users to have the minimal amount of equipment to be able to utilize our product as possible. And and by having to get a VR headset and other technology, that's sort of going against the grain there. So I think we can have a bigger impact by simplifying our experience and making it more compelling to users than having to raise the the barrier for them to have to be able to use these appliances.

Yeah, and that's actually a probably a good segue. You know, we one thing we we talk a lot about is uh behavior as currency. And actually the New Zealand team was, I think, we believe was the first that actually created IP around that your your activity creates a token, like a blockchain token, right? So linking activity to a currency. And so the New Zealand did that way, way back. Uh, and which you probably know exactly when, but like, you know, probably seven, eight years ago. But so when we think of VR or AR, like we think big headsets, but now you look at what what Meta does with the Ray bands, right? They're obviously very, very lightweight and not that expensive. And so we could start, you know, gamify certain things, right? Like as you walk around and you build up a currency, and then you know, you there could be some easy prompts and notches that just so without overwhelming you with a lot of digital content, but there could be you know little notches and prompts popping up in the array bands or uh and then that could lead some kind of brand partnerships where you earn some sort of an earnout, right? Like we work, we mentioned here we we're partnering with Mavi, where exactly that concept, right? Behavior as currency. So you do what's right for you and your health and for your community, and you build up a currency then you can redeem with brand partners. And so something as as a light as a footprint or a wearable, like like a Ray Bandac could play into that.

Yeah. And so when you get that currency, like essentially I mentioned you mentioned brand partnerships, but like specifically, would that be like I could go buy element, right? LMT because I like it as a you know electrolyte mix, or I could go, yeah, I don't know, name another consumer product, right? That you could go that's within the wellness space or experiences maybe, or like trial, like what what kind of what kind of rewards are you thinking?

To give you an example, right? Like so we we're doing some pilots now with uh fire departments, and that could be a mobility challenge, you know, two-week mobility challenge with you know with mover content and sponsored by therabody, right? And so for all the service members that participate in this two-week challenge, they would earn either product or or you know, with with therabody, right? Either discounted or a free product, or obviously however we structure that. So that's like that that's a good example to illustrate that.

Yeah, yeah, I like it. I mean, ultimately, guys, like we you know, we're we live in a capitalist culture, so all this is amazing, right? That we can do now technology and personalizing it through the phone and you know, specific subsets of our population can get very specific uh you know plans for what they what they need. So it's getting amazing, but people need to show ROI, right? So is getting people on a path to better health within like a corporate or you know, we talk about DOD or fire departments, uh, first responders, things like that. What have you guys seen? Is it actually saving money for the organizations and also help making people healthier? Like what's the bottom, the bottom dollar? Bottom line dollar change. Did I say that right? I think I butchered that. Anyway, you get the point.

I think getting people moving is is there's a huge benefit not only to society as a whole, but also from a healthcare cost point of view. You know, our research shows that if you move someone from being sedentary to moderately active, so that's meeting Center for Disease Control or World Health Organization recommendations of a 150 minutes of moderate activity a week, that's going to save around $1,300 per year in healthcare costs. If you think that you know 25% of the adult population is not active, not meeting those guidelines, that that extrapolates out to 65 million adults, that's $85 billion a year in healthcare savings. That's a big number.

That's a big number.

Yeah, right. And and I think you could argue that there's a big return on investment there, not only from a dollar point of view, but also just, hey, what does that mean for society and productivity as a whole? I think where we can play a big part as well is is you know that make that moving people from from sedentary to moderately active is great, and it's but it's binary, right? So you're either doing 150 minutes or you're not. How do we engage users so that they could do 75 minutes? And how do we how do we actually get them moving so that it's it's not just uh a win or lose? It's actually, hey, they're doing what is healthy and good for them. And over time we can shift their behaviors to to do more activity. So, you know, removing that win or lose mentality at the front to be able to, hey, we're still going to reward you if if you're doing 3,000 steps. Because that's good if you were only doing 1,000 previously. And so, yeah, really being able to help guide users and make them move smarter and win.

Yeah, and I was just circling back a little bit to what we talked about in the beginning, right? The consumer grade, but also that there's there's pool from the consumer, right? So it's not so much like you have to convince people to get active, but like and I keep going back to the example of the firefighters. Like when we talked to some of the fire chiefs, they said, like, if you talked to firemen about two years ago about Vilates or Breath Work, they would have laughed at you. And they said that completely changed, that wellness really skyrocketed to the top. Whereas like they understand health span, they understand mobility health, they understand you know mental health and and why breath work is into so it's fascinating to see how the demand is now coming from from the user more and more, and they understand the why, right? And that's I think that's a massive shift. And that's obviously going to show in absenteeism, that's gonna show in premiums, right? And so back to with your question about the hard dollar impact. So, but yeah, we're very encouraged to see how how the consumer really understands this now.

And the same is true for the Air Force as well, right? So if if they've spent all this money recruiting and training people, and then as part of life, people are that the service members are uh having families, having children, etc. How do we how do we help guide their users back to force readiness? You know, because that's going to help with attrition and turnover. That has a huge benefit to to the Air Force and other military branches as well as as well as law enforcement first responders. Um it's keeping people engaged, healthy, and and ready to be productive in whatever line they're in.

I think that's a huge, I mean, just across the board, right? When you look at um the level of education of the normal consumer when it comes to health and wellness is increasing at a pretty fast rate. Like I maybe it's just who I hang out with, or because I run a podcast like this. But if I'm hanging out with you know friends or I was having watching a baseball game with a friend of mine the other day, and we start really many questions about like um specific supplements, he was asking me about that or parametric chambers, like things like that. I'm like, wow, like this is this is a much different conversation than I would have been having five years ago for sure. Right. And I think that's starting to trickle up. And you know, to your point, Sam, is like the demand is starting from the ground up, which is very different than trying to push it from the top down. And that that's you know, eventually it kind of meets somewhere in the middle where those two things are driving, right? But uh, you know, capital incentives from the top, and then you know, overall feeling good and looking good and you know, um, living a fuller life from the consumer standpoint, those are gonna meet. And it's a really cool time. I don't know what it's gonna look like. I'm sure it's gonna be messy for a while until we kind of figure it out, frothy, as you may say, Simon. But it's uh, you know, it's it's a really interesting time. I think I don't think it's just those populations you guys talked about, but fire and and do, but I think it's just the general consumer.

Yeah, very much so. No, you're right.

It's fun. Yeah. Um, let's talk about what you guys need right now. So uh, you know, as as people are tuning in, and uh, I know you guys are specifically looking for some partnerships and things like that, but if people are going to reach out to you guys, like what's what's the most critical thing you guys are looking for right now? Um, how can the industry help you guys with your mission?

Yeah, partnerships are definitely very much at the core, right? Like we we want to assemble kind of a best of breed offering, right? Like, because and I think that's what we talked actually. Last time I talked to you on a podcast, one was you know, is this notion of interoperability, right? Like it used to be that fitness apps or whatever were very siloed and kind of walled off gardens. And we, you know, just a couple of years ago when we talked last, that was one of the predictions is like, hey, these walls are going to come down and these systems start talking to each other. So that's definitely we want to assemble a best of breed kind of matrix, right? Like I said, we bring in Mover for mobility health, uh, we bring in Mavi for this kind of marketplace, brand partnerships, currency as behavior. Uh, we bring in a company called Neuropeak for uh breath work, right? For mental health and de stressing. So we're looking for partners, especially kind of in the nutrition space. So yeah, we we want to work with with the best in the field, right? And then pair and aptive is is more kind of the the OS that kind of curates these different components and content. So can we orchestrate it and and bring it together? So that definitely would be a a big thing we're looking for, is to like, hey, who else can we work with to address certain the you know, certain audiences or demographics or certain issues or yeah, yeah.

I can think of like 10 off the top of my head that you guys should probably talk to because that you know, if you're trying to create like the super offering and listed thing, and there's so many cool things, there's like new sleep technologies coming out, of course, biomarker testing, and it's all democratizing fairly quickly, like it's becoming more and more accessible. So man, a lot of cool technology coming out. I mean, when you look at all these wellness technologies, um, it's kind of a fun question, but what what over the next five years gets you guys the most excited? Right? Is it like I don't know, advancements in sleep technology? Is it advancements in you know um peptides? Like what do you guys get most excited about when when it comes to technology? Do first.

Yeah, I look, I think I think what what Simon's touching on is this ecosystem. I think the ability for multiple sources of data to be able to be made sense of. I think that is is very exciting. Understanding the interaction between between all these elements, you know, whether it's sleep, whether it's your nutrition, whether it's your hydration. Previously we've had some really solid products that have been able to do things in isolation or siloed, but being able to bring them together to be able to give meaningful insights on how a user at a personal level can take those insights and change their behavior. I'd like to think that that is that is one of the things that we're going to be able to see is that really high level of personalized well-being that will exist in the market. Yeah, I I I think that that's that's going to have an explosive opportunity. Yeah.

Simon, what comes to mind?

Yeah, I mean, I'm I'm gonna kind of you know repeat myself a little bit from the previous part, but I think that the portability into interoperability is important, right? So whatever so let's say I I do all my exercise and workouts and things in aptive, right? But on the other side, I I signed up with functional health and I did all my labs, but they don't talk to each other. So I think these these systems need, and that's going to be really interesting with all these AI agents. We can just have the aptive agent talk to the functional health agent, right? And so now these things start fusing. And then same thing with MAVI, right? So now I you know I exercise and I eat well, and you know, and that I get I get rewarded on the Mavi side, right? So I get a discount or you know, sweet, maybe you know, I earn a sweet green meal, or I get discounts on something I want to buy, right? And it's and it's kind of that's what I love. You know, the new New Zealand team talks a lot about gaming theory, right? Oftentimes when you are in a in a game, you earn things that make you better at the game, right? And so that's kind of the same thing. I exercise and I get half off of a therapy theragon, right? And so that makes me better at you know my wellness routine and or I earn some sort of a discount with Thorn supplements, and that makes me better again in the game, right? So I think that that's exciting, right? To to kind of have these systems come together and the experience is portable, right? No matter if I'm at home or at the gym or wherever life takes me. So that's that's really what we are excited about.

Yeah, it's it's so funny, like you say AIs talking to each other. And I just caught myself in a meeting last week where it's like a gentleman was like, Hey, you know, I'm do you guys mind signing an NDA? And I just joked, I'm like, well, yeah, just have your GPT send the end day over to my GPT and then because you know it's gonna happen, right? He's just probably gonna pull one right from there, and then I'm gonna throw it through mine, and then pretty soon it's like, well, what are we even talking? Let's just have things connect. It's getting weird, is all I'm trying to say. I didn't think I would be saying that three years ago that this is actually happening. Have your AI talk to my AI. Yeah, right. I don't know. I don't know. Well, anyway, guys, it's super interesting stuff, and and thank you for coming back and um you know updating us and everything that that you're working on. But I this is the future, right? It's pulling in all these. I've been talking about for many years, you know, where will data start coming out about like, okay, well, it's the what now problems. Like, okay, people are getting fed data, but what now? Like, what do they do with it? But to have the the structure around it and being able to pull in multiple things and have you know pull from right sources and make it seem seamless to the user and easy, that's that's not an easy lift. So keep up the great work. If people want to get a hold of you guys, or if you want them to go somewhere, where would you like them to go?

Yeah, aptdif.com. Aptive as in A-A-P-T-I-V. Yeah, apdif.com.

Cool. Right on, right on. Well, you guys, thank you so much. Simon, it's always a pleasure seeing me again. Rich, thanks for joining me. Thank you. Yeah, ladies and gentlemen, Simon Rich. Cheers. Hey, wait, don't leave yet. This was your host, Eric Malzone, and I hope you enjoyed this episode of Future of Minus. If you did, I'm gonna ask you to do three simple things. It takes under five minutes and it goes such a long way. We really appreciate it. Number one, please subscribe to our show wherever you listen to it, iTunes, Spotify, Castbox, whatever it may be. Number two, please leave us a favorable review. Number three, share. Put it on social media, talk about it to your friends, send it in a text message, whatever it may be. Please share this episode because we put a lot of work into it. We want to make sure that as many people are getting value out of it as possible. Lastly, if you'd like to learn more, get in touch with me, simply go to the futurofitness.co. You can subscribe to our newsletter there, or you can simply get in touch with me as I love to hear from our listeners. So thank you so much. This is Eric Malzone, and this is the future of fitness. Have a great day.