Fitness brand GOQii widens losses in FY19 on higher R&D, promotional spends

Personal fitness platform GOQii Technologies’ losses for the financial year ended March 31 widened due to increased allocated spending on research and development and promotional activities. 

The company reported a net loss of Rs 27 crore for FY19 compared to Rs 19 crore in the previous year. Despite the increase in the losses, it hopes to turn profitable with healthy growth numbers in FY20, GOQii said in a regulatory filing. 

The company’s other expenses, which include research and development and promotional costs more than doubled to Rs 18 crore from Rs 6 crore in the previous year, taking the total expenditure to Rs 49 crore from Rs 31 crore in FY18.

GOQii’s employee costs too rose to Rs 12 crore from Rs 9 crore in the previous year. 

Despite the widening losses, the company’s total revenue rose 91% to Rs 22 crore from Rs 11 crore in the previous year. The bulk of the total revenue came from wellness coaching services, software development services, marketplace commission, sale of traded goods, and commission on diagnostic services.

Founded in 2014 by Vishal Gondal, the California-based company has offices in Mumbai and Shenzhen. It offers fitness and health services which combine individual personal coaching and fitness tracking technology. GOQii provides personalised coaching and wearable technology along with its ecommerce stores and e-cash business, which rewards users on achieving milestones.

Media group Bennett Coleman & Co, actor Akshay Kumar, Tata Group Emeritus Ratan Tata, Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma, and Tokyo-based Mitsui & Co are among the investors in GOQii.  

In May, a Mumbai court had barred sellers on ecommerce major Flipkart along with other platforms from selling GOQii’s products after the latter alleged that the sellers were selling the products at a discount in violation of the sale agreement.