Blue Goji Joins Partnership for a Healthier America and Commits to Improve the Health and Wellbeing of Low Income Children at Building A Healthier Future Summit

AUSTIN, Texas & WASHINGTON--()--Blue Goji®, a wellness technology company, announced today that it has joined the Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA) and, in collaboration with The Coleman Fung Foundation Inc., has committed to improving the health and wellbeing of low-income children in America.

Headquartered in Washington, D.C., PHA works closely with the private sector and PHA honorary chair First Lady Michelle Obama to help end childhood obesity.

Based in Austin, Texas, Blue Goji develops technology that makes fitness fun. Blue Goji’s Goji Play fitness game system transforms conventional cardio workouts into engaging and fun experiences for both adults and kids. The Goji Play game system earned a coveted 2016 Red Dot Award for Product Design. The Coleman Fung Foundation was established in 2006 to support educational, social, and veteran-based initiatives.

“As a new Partner with PHA, Blue Goji shares the Partnership for a Healthier America’s mission to end the childhood obesity epidemic within a generation. In addition to high rates of obesity and the extensive problems associated with nutrition, low-income children often face a range of other challenges by the time they enter Pre-K or kindergarten,” Fung commented. “Most low-income kids enter school lacking basic abilities such as letter recognition and counting skills; their families tend to struggle with many economic, social, emotional, and health issues; they relocate frequently; and few low-income kids get outside stimulation or enrichment opportunities. The unfortunate truth is that, once these ‘at risk’ kids are behind at such an early age, they are likely to stay behind for life! This is why Blue Goji is standing with PHA and making this commitment publicly today.”

Fung added: “Blue Goji will create a unique, adaptive platform for holistic wellness and LEARNING for low-income kids! We will do so by extending and enhancing our Goji Play fitness game system and our gamified GojiVerse wellness platform. And combining it – through the new Fung Fellowship for Wellness and Technology Innovations at UC Berkeley – with recent game science studies and neuroscience research that have shown that physical exercises have a range of positive impacts on brain activities.”

Partnering with The Coleman Fung Foundation, Blue Goji is creating The Fung Fellowship for Wellness and Technology Innovations at the University of California, Berkeley. This new undergraduate program features an academic curriculum jointly supported by Blue Goji and the UC Berkeley Brain Initiative, the College of Engineering, and the School of Public Health. The two-year Fung Fellowship for Wellness and Technology Innovations program will leverage Blue Goji’s gamification of health, wellness, and learning platform and promote student-led efforts in developing potential solutions to curb childhood obesity, especially for underserved communities.

“Imagine outfitting Pre-K and Kindergarten classrooms with Goji Virtual Reality (VR) Stations to infuse physical activities into the learning process and to incentivize good behavior and academic success! With a new type of epic, “hero’s journey-themed” immersive games such as AdventureCorp, NinjaCamp, MarsStation, and CreativeDome, low income kids may be able to catch up – in a fully engaged and physically ActiveVR way – by learning about wildlife conservation, marine biology, space exploration and other fun subject matters. Whether they’re flying through the savannah or diving in the deep sea, we hope to improve a child’s mental and physical states and abilities -- what we call holistic wellness -- through immersive VR gaming experiences,” Fung said.

“Today, one in three American children are still not living at a healthy weight and not all Americans have the same opportunities to be healthy,” said PHA CEO Lawrence A. Soler. “With the help of our ever-widening range of partners and especially Blue Goji, together we are creating a healthier environment for America’s children, who are developing lifelong habits they can pass on to their own children.”

About Blue Goji

Blue Goji was founded in 2011 on the big data software development and gaming expertise of its founders who are focused on changing the health and wellness game. Fung, the founder and former CEO of OpenLink, aligned with Charles Huang and Kai Huang, brothers who developed the highly successful Guitar Hero franchise, to start Blue Goji. For more information, please see www.bluegoji.com.

About The Partnership for a Healthier America (PHA)

The Partnership for a Healthier America is devoted to working with the private sector to ensure the health of our nation’s youth by solving the childhood obesity crisis. In 2010, PHA was created in conjunction with – but independent from – First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! effort. PHA is a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that is led by some of the nation’s most respected health and childhood obesity experts. PHA brings together public, private and nonprofit leaders to broker meaningful commitments and develop strategies to end childhood obesity. Most important, PHA ensures that commitments made are commitments kept by working with unbiased, third parties to monitor and publicly report on the progress our partners are making. For more information about PHA, please visit www.aHealthierAmerica.org and follow PHA on Twitter @PHAnews.

Goji Play, GojiGo, GojiTate, GojiVerse and other products, brands and trademarks are the property of Blue Goji. All other brand and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

Contacts

PR Consultant for Blue Goji
Laura M. Pennino, 281.286.9398, 713.419.1776 mobile
lp@penninoandpartners.com
@laurapennino
or
Marketing Associate for Blue Goji
Stephanie Barbour, 512.270.4747 x 108
stephanie@bluegoji.com
@BlueGoji

Release Summary

Blue Goji Joins Partnership for a Healthier America and Commits to Improve the Health and Wellbeing of Low Income Children at Building a Healthier Future Summit, Hosts Virtual Reality Demos Today

Contacts

PR Consultant for Blue Goji
Laura M. Pennino, 281.286.9398, 713.419.1776 mobile
lp@penninoandpartners.com
@laurapennino
or
Marketing Associate for Blue Goji
Stephanie Barbour, 512.270.4747 x 108
stephanie@bluegoji.com
@BlueGoji