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MHT's Michelle Lang: Local tech execs tackle the Boston Marathon
The Murphy brothers' software-selling family tree
All over the world, runners and athletes are turning to Boston for expert coaching. And it’s the efforts of Boston’s software developers, not its pro sports franchises, that are drawing the eyes of a new generation of champions.
Boston is becoming a hub for information technology and games that help people achieve fitness goals. AWare Technologies Inc., FitnessKeeper Inc. and Molecular Inc. all track fitness data via cellular phones and web applications. Meanwhile, video game developers are in Boston today for the fifth annual Games for Health Conference on fitness-based “XRgames.”
“Boston is so primed for this,” said conference organizer Ben Sawyer, co-founder of Portland, Maine-based serious game development studio Digitalmill Inc. “It’s an area where you have capital, game developers and health experts in one place.”
Eventually, mobile fitness tracking applications and video games like Electronic Arts Inc.’s (Nasdaq: ERTS) EA Sports Active will integrate with electronic medical records, he predicted.
Boston-based FitnessKeeper and Cambridge-based AWare Technologies make fitness tracking applications that use Apple Inc.’s (Nasdaq: APPL) iPhone accelerometer and GPS to track the mileage and speed of each run, displaying the data in a web application.
FitnessKeeper founder Jason Jacobs has gone a step further.
“I’ve seen other apps out there that are in this space, but the thing he’s done really well is he’s building this tribe of followers using social media,” said user Bill Bither, who is training for the 2010 Boston Marathon.
Bither, who is president and founder of Easthampton-based software maker Atalasoft Inc., at first was unsure he wanted to broadcast his running regimen on Twitter. Once he tried it, however, he found he liked the feature.
“There is this sense of community,” he said. “You can check out what other people are doing and motivate yourself based on what other runners and cyclists have done.”
Adidas AG’s miCoach adds custom programs that relay coaching advice via earbuds on a Samsung phone, urging the runner to push harder or ease up, based on pace and heart rate. Watertown-based web development firm Molecular is handling the online user interface. Users like the coaching, but many are just as interested in slicing and dicing the data, said Brian Gillespie, director of strategic design at Molecular.
“We thought, ‘Oh, the main experience is going to be during the workout when you’re hearing the coach’s voice through the headset,’” he said. “Honestly we found that a lot of people are very fascinated by the information presented through the statistical screens.”
Statistics like these will play a major role in the future of health care, Digitalmill’s Sawyer predicted, as data from all forms of exercise become integrated with one another, and eventually with electronic medical records.
“The ultimate customization is a video game that you just turn on and it goes, ‘Hey, Ben, I noticed your doctor would like you to eat less trans-fatty-whatever,’” he said. “You go to your doctor’s office and your doctor has your EA Sports Active profile and says, ‘Hey, you’re doing really well.’”
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