Social game inspires 'healthy' competition between coworkers

Corporate professionals stuck behind a desk all day, this social gaming service is for you: Vivecoach inspires healthy competition between you and coworkers by offering up fitness, weight-loss, or nutrition challenges, to see how you measure up to, say, Bob in Accounting.

And the Menlo Park, California-based company is off to a good start. On June 21, they announced $1.5 million in funding led by two individual investors.

Vivecoach is up and running in more than 20 countries, and according to a press release, its target is large public companies and institutions. The platform includes goal settings, individual and team challenges, physical activity and weight loss tracking, and reminders via mobile and text messaging. According to the release, challenges are short and sweet, typically one- to four-week competitions focused on weight, exercising more, and making smarter snack choices when you've hit an afternoon slump.

Another company offering social gaming for employees is Keas, which also inspires competition between coworkers to keep them healthy and fit. US-based Keas encourages companies to use the service to help cut health insurance costs, noting that healthier employees could be linked to better organizational performance. Keas cites tech research company Gartner as stating one-half of all US companies will be using games to motivate employees by 2015.

http://www.vivecoach.com
http://keas.com