It is funny how people get stuck in traffic on their way to the gym to ride stationary bicycles. Get the extra miles using LoopFit, which is never crowded and is one stop solution for indoor fitness. Telugu360 is in conversation with the founders Jignesh Talasila, Ravi Theja Muthu, Suraj Vanka, Karthik KV, and RavitejaKoneru of startup Loop Reality who are pioneers in Virtual and Augmented reality…
What is LoopFit?
We have taken a bicycle, a bicycle trainer, a PC and a VR headset to give fitness fanatics an experience of riding in the pleasant locations around the world without actually having to hit the roads. LoopFit brings impeccable mélange of immersive VR, IoT, and analytics in a multiplayer fitness solution, making workouts more exciting and enjoyable while staying indoors. On LoopFit, you can also challenge any of your friends across the world to race against you.
What was/is the most challenging thing using the latest tech like VR, IoT, and analytics?
Initially, everything seemed difficult as none of us had relevant experience. Understanding the VR/AR piece was tough in itself. But we mastered it tinkering around the challenges we encountered. We are presently cracking the very vast analytics segment. Our USP is that we have excelled at the art of integrating technologies. Another challenge is to find talent who are good at these technologies.
Can you tell us about your first pitching in San Francisco?
We faced a lot of challenges for our first pitch in San Francisco, ranging from access to hardware to compatibility of devices. We built a functional prototype with everything within our reach and presented it at TechCrunch Disrupt. Though our product was not fully functional, we got to witness the excitement around VR and also received a lot of feedback on our product. One of the notable ones was from Mike Butcher, the Editor-in-Chief at TechCrunch. He was ecstatic about the whole idea of riding a VR bicycle and gave us a couple of bytes. We relayed the feedback immediately to our team here.
How was the response at Oculus Connect and Loop Reality’s trip to Portugal?
We presented screen recordings of the environments we created in VR to John Carmack, CTO of Oculus, at Oculus Connect 3. He was amazed seeing the high quality of work, and even more surprised to learn that this was from an Indian startup. That gave us lot encouragement and we decided to take our functional prototype to Web Summit at Lisbon, Portugal. We had discussions with officials from both, Indian and Portuguese government. We were delighted to see the efforts of both the countries in building bridges and helping the startup ecosystem grow in both the lands. Later when the PM of Portugal visited India, we were among the three startups from India to pitch to him the delegation of officials from Portugal.
So how is the funding pattern now?
We are currently bootstrapped, having made little investments from our team. We are in the process of raising funds to launch our product into the market soon.
When will be the product out in the market?
We are targeting to launch it in December in the Indian market, focusing on the B2B segment. We already have a pipeline of about 45 orders in India and interest from several people who want to see the final product first. We plan to sell it to at least 100 customers immediately after launch. We will be focusing on markets outside of India subsequently post our launch.
How is the response from the B2B segments?
The response is very exciting. We have had very encouraging discussions with the majority of the big chains in India. We have also had several conversations with gym chains in Nordics and in Singapore. Once the final prototype is available for them to do a dry run, they would be scaling out. We are currently focusing on the B2B segment with gyms, health clubs and corporate offices as our potential customers.
Why is there so much delay in the launch?
There are multiple reasons, with access to hardware in India being a primary concern. Availability of skilled talent has also been a great challenge. Also, we never considered external funding and wanted to remain bootstrapped. However, considering the growing excitement for VR/AR globally, we are also raising funds to push our product into the market at the earliest.
So that’s why LoopFit is going to be an expensive affair?
LoopFit will be priced at INR 3 Lakh in India for the B2B segment. A major component of this cost is for procuring high-end VR devices such as HTC Vive and Oculus, which cost almost twice in India than the price in the global market. However, in other countries, LoopFit would be priced at about $ 3000-4500. As a separate offering, we also plan to provide the hardware, on which one can mount the bicycle, along with the software for about $ 1000.
Are there compatibility issues or restrictions on devices?
We are compatible to both, Oculus and HTC Vive. We want to ensure that we are capable of cater to any device, including the ones set to be launched at a lower price end of around $ 200, later this year. Our focus is to let the customers get the maximum out of the headset they own, with us being the functional piece.
In the due course, you also partnered with a doctor to re-imagine Cancer therapy treatment. Can you tell us about that?
We met the musculoskeletal oncologist, Dr. Pramod Chinder, at Oculus Connect 3. He was researching on VR pain therapy for his patients. Patients have inhibitions to undergo therapy immediately after surgery. The doctor was using VR to divert their attention, thus reducing the mental agony. We contributed content by providing our already developed peaceful, serene environments.
So, you are also doing consulting services apart from developing your product?
We partnered with innovation cells of a few multinational corporations, to consult on innovative ways of integrating advanced technologies, as novel solutions for their clients. We have explored applications of these technologies across fields like healthcare, training, assessment, among others, while working with clients from both, India and abroad.
What can we expect from Loop Reality in near future?
There are always other spaces tempting but we are focused on fitness, wellness, and healthcare in the long run. A couple of years down the line, we also plan to introduce this technology in Aerobic classes and Zumba. We are here to solve the problem of fitness and so we ask our customers to wait for the launch of LoopFit. Grab it the moment you get a chance and stay fit.
