2_0_DiscoverGermany_August 2015_Issue29:Scan Magazine 1
27/7/15
16:51
Page 122
dacadoo ag Digital health and wellbeing Keeping healthy can be a challenge. Some lack the motivation to do sports, others fail to make sense out of the huge amount of data that fitness tracking apps, pedometers and digital scales provide. dacadoo offers a holistic solution for tracking, managing and testing one’s health in an easy, entertaining way. TEXT: JULIKA HÜTHER | PHOTOS: DACADOO AG
The innovative, award-winning Swiss health engagement software company was founded in 2010 by Peter Ohnemus, who had sold his previous company the year before and had decided to take some time off to recuperate mentally and physically by ski mountaineering. In the beginning, Ohnemus struggled to walk up the mountain, but over the course of days and weeks, climbing heights became easier. This sparked the idea of tracking his physical progress in real time and visualising the effect the training has on his health and wellbeing in a simple, straightforward way. Thus the Health Score was created, a single number from one to 1,000, which measures the health and wellbeing of any individual in real time.This dynamic value depends on the user’s body metrics, his or her emotions and lifestyle. “The holistic approach
122 | Issue 29 | August 2015
provides users with a simple, all-inclusive score that is generated from a multitude of health and fitness data,” says Manuel Heuer, COO of dacadoo.
continuously improve their health. They use motivational techniques used in online video games, social and collaborative motivators found in social networking sites as well as personalised feedback and coaching based on the data generated for each user.“Our aim is to support users so that they keep at it and do more for themselves,” Heuer says. With a brand new version of dacadoo launching this autumn, users can be sure that keeping track of their health will become even more engaging. www.dacadoo.com
“We are an open platform,”Heuer continues, “meaning we can connect with the most popular devices such as pedometers and digital scales and applications such as fitness tracking apps. Although dacadoo offers its own app that can record over 115 different indoor and outdoor activities, we do not want to force anyone to use it. If users have amassed data through different devices or apps, they do not need to start all over again but can connect their data to dacadoo.” But the Health Score is not the only way the company keeps their users motivated to
Portrait: Manuel Heuer