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Technical.ly
03-07-2025
- Business
- Technical.ly
How On the Goga is reimagining corporate employee wellness programs
Startup profile: On the Goga Founded by: Anna Greenwald Year founded: 2015 Headquarters: Philadelphia, PA Sector: Healthcare Funding and valuation: $1.3 million in funding, according to the company Key ecosystem partners: PIDC, Ben Franklin Technology Partners, University of Pennsylvania Anna Greenwald didn't dream of being a wellness entrepreneur. She came to Philadelphia from Madison, Wisconsin, in 2011 as an aspiring opera singer with an interest in entrepreneurship, attending Drexel University's music industry program. When a vocal cord injury derailed her plans, leaving her emotionally devastated, Greenwald's physician insisted she start taking yoga. 'My first thought was, absolutely not,' Greenwald, now the founder and CEO of the corporate wellness platform On the Goga, told 'I'm not a hippie, and I hate exercise, so why would I try yoga?' On the Goga — the name a mashup of 'on the go' and 'yoga' — is now a national employee wellness platform serving a diverse array of clients, from small companies to large enterprises. With a recent $300,000 seed extension and a mission to transform corporate wellness, the company is leveraging technology, AI and a pre-clinical approach to employee well-being. While employee behavior tracking is becoming increasingly popular with corporations, On the Goga doesn't incorporate individual monitoring into its platform, instead collecting the broader organizational data, aggregating it and shares findings with clients that they can act on. 'We can share insights to employers to say, hey, the top driver of burnout for your employees is meeting schedules,' Greenwald said. While the platform doesn't flag clients when employees may need clinical intervention, it acts as an integrator, making clinical employee resources, such as therapy benefits offered by the company, visible on the platform. A decade and two business models in, the company continues to evolve and grow. Yoga proved life-changing in more ways than one Greenwald, as you may have guessed, took her doctor's advice and made what would become the life-altering decision to try yoga. 'I happened to have this amazing yoga teacher in West Philly who was very mindfulness-based,' Greenwald said. 'No one was talking to me about anything that would have put me off — she just was like, 'this is what happens in your body when you breathe.'' Over the course of a year, she said, yoga changed her life, physically and cognitively. 'I was just a happier, healthier person because of this simple practice of breathing,' she said. Greenwald knew it wasn't some kind of magic. There was science behind it, and she dove into the research. She wanted other people — especially 'wellness skeptics' like her, who had preconceived notions of yoga and thought it wasn't for them — to transform themselves, too. The in-person early days She started On the Goga in 2015 as a sort of special-order yoga instructor who would come to clients' homes, workplaces and events. Clients included an Eagles player, bachelorette parties, and eventually, company HR directors looking to add yoga to their employee offerings. Very quickly, Greenwald saw the potential in employee yoga training. People who didn't 'get' yoga weren't likely to hire her, but through their employers, she could reach some of her fellow skeptics. 'I wanted to help other people realize that they already had all of the tools in themselves to change their lives,' she said. 'If I could deliver that through organizations that paid for this, for folks who would not otherwise be able to have access to these tools, that was the ultimate goal.' As the business grew from a solopreneurship venture to a small team in the late 2010s, On the Goga established itself as a local wellness company that brought yoga and mindfulness to the boardrooms of Philly companies in the never-ending battle against employee burnout. Greenwald led many classes herself, in person on site or at company retreats. It was about more than giving employees a break to center themselves. Greenwald recognized the potential of yoga and mindfulness to help companies thrive. 'Mindfulness is the foundation for all of the skills that help people to be leaders — empathy, perspective, foresight, objective thinking, boundary setting,' she said. 'We started doing leadership training, cooking, physical fitness, financial prosperity.' There was no tech platform in the early days, but the small team thought about the possibilities of making one. Meditation apps were growing in popularity, but there wasn't an app out there that did what On the Goga did for employees. Still, the in-person business model was working. That would all change in 2020, when the COVID pandemic hit. A costly but high-potential shift The in-person model of On the Goga didn't have much overhead, making it possible to bootstrap. When the company had to go virtual during the COVID lockdowns in 2020, it became clear that to shift toward being a tech platform, it was going to need outside funding. The first funding it received was a capital loan from the PIDC, a Philadelphia-based Community Development Financial Institution that helped the On the Goga team build the beta version of the tech platform. 'From that, it took off,' Greenwald said. 'We scaled with some incredible local partners.' By 2022 — which Greenwald considers to be the founding of the new On the Goga — it had become clear that the platform had legs. She applied to the national Techstars accelerator, and On the Goga was accepted. In 2023, it had its initial pre-seed. Its first seed round raised just under a million dollars from local investors, including Ben Franklin Technology Partners, Penn's Wharton Fund for Health and local angels. This year, it closed a $300,000 seed extension round in just three weeks. 'I think Philadelphia is one of the best cities in the world to start a business,' Greenwald said. 'We used the amazing Philadelphia network and community and some really fun, scrappy, guerrilla marketing tactics to get this thing off the ground.' Preventing burnout and maintaining a healthy workplace The On the Goga platform puts a wellness tool into the pockets of employees, with an app that can call up resources, wellness strategies and breathing exercises on demand, and allow them to attend live virtual workshops with coworkers. The idea is not to treat burnout, but to prevent everyday stresses from snowballing into a mental health crisis. 'We call it 'pre-clinical,'' Greenwald said. 'What we found through our years of experience is that if you wait to solve people's problems reactively after they're already experiencing them, you're waiting too long when it comes to organizational intervention.' More than anything, Greenwald seeks to redefine 'wellness' — a term that turns off a lot of people for a lot of reasons, from its 'hippie' associations to toxic workplace wellness programs that focus more on penalizing employees based on body mass index than on emotional safety. 'We want people to think of corporate wellness as, 'this is the best place to work,'' she said, noting that every expectation On the Goga places on its clients, it places on itself. As the client platform incorporates more AI (among other things, Greenwald has given talks on 'AI for emotionally intelligent leadership'), much of it starts at home base, with AI tools helping with productivity. A big focus right now, she said, is using AI to improve the bandwidth and burnout of On the Goga's own internal team. 'We're heavily leaning into developing workplace best practices around AI that are ethical, secure and supporting metrics on our team,' she said. 'Do you have enough time in the week to get things done? Do you have enough time in the week for creativity? And how is AI impacting these metrics that we know drive engagement and productivity over time?' It's all part of the reimagining. 'Our mission statement,' Greenwald said, 'is to make the future of work more human.'
Business Recorder
02-07-2025
- Business
- Business Recorder
Minister calls for groundbreaking of KIP on September 4
Islamabad: Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal chaired a meeting with officers from the Ministry of Industries and Production, Board of Investment and Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation to review the progress of the high-priority Karachi Industrial Park project. The CEO of Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation (PIDC) briefed the Minister on the project's status, highlighting that the original master plan envisioned a phased development approach. The revised PC1 covers development of Block A which is 550 acres long. Furthermore, the Minister directed Industries section of Planning Ministry to evaluate the updated PC1 in the light of revised project scope and instructed stakeholders to prepare for groundbreaking ceremony scheduled for September 4. Rizwan Bhatti, CEO PIDC briefed the Minister that the master plan features industry clustering and was administratively approved on April 21. The project is slated for completion within 15 months. The total project cost is estimated at Rs 7.404 billion, to be financed over six quarters. Dr Erfa Iqbal, Additional Secretary of the Board of Investment mentioned that the project's provisional concept paper would be approved in the next board meeting. The Karachi Industrial Park will provide a plug and play environment to investors at minimal land costs, facilitated through a bankable lease or rental model. While discussing plot allotment, the Minister directed PIDC to establish standards for plot allocation to big and small industries, emphasizing the need for a detailed plan. The Minister stressed on the importance of the Industrial Park, calling it a one-stop facility committed to enhancing investor experience by providing utilities like water, electricity, telecommunication, as well as transportation networks and waste management systems. 'The centralized approach of Karachi Industrial Park will facilitate coordination with all relevant government agencies, reducing bureaucratic hurdles', remarked the Minister. The Federal Minister highlighted the importance of industrial parks in developed countries, stating that these parks should offer community life and facilities, combining "life, leisure, and work." The Federal Minister also advised stakeholders to draw inspiration from Singapore and Vietnam's industrial parks, which cater to all needs. The Arabian Sea Country Club, located adjacent to the right side of the Park, will be revived by PIDC and would serve as a prime entertainment facility, offering recreational facilities. Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
Business Recorder
22-05-2025
- Business
- Business Recorder
NA panel reviews SMEDA, PIDC performance
ISLAMABAD: A parliamentary panel on Wednesday conducted a comprehensive examination and review of the performance, operational functions, and organisational structures of the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority (SMEDA) and the Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation (PIDC). The 2nd meeting of the Sub-Committee of National Assembly Standing Committee on Industries and Production met here on Wednesday with Muhammad Mobeen Arif in chair. The committee was appraised that SMEDA is an autonomous institution of the under Ministry of Industries and Production. SMEDA was established in October 1998 for encouraging and facilitating the development and growth of small and medium enterprises in the country. SMEDA is not only an SME policy-advisory body for the government of Pakistan but also facilitates other stakeholders in addressing their SME development agendas. Further the body formulate a policy to encourage the growth of SMEs in the country and advise the government on fiscal and monetary issues related to SMEs, facilitation of Business Development Services to SMEs and facilitate the development and strengthening of SME representative bodies associations/ chambers. Currently, SMEDA has a portfolio of twenty-eight projects with a total outlay of Rs4.2 billion. The authority has provided more than 0.15 million SME facilitation, over 4750 trainings, more than 400 pre-feasibility studies and over 600 consultants profiles. PIDC primarily operates as an infrastructure developer of industrial parks /estates to facilitate industrial growth across Pakistan. Five Industrial Parks are being developed/ managed by PIDC. Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
Express Tribune
26-03-2025
- Automotive
- Express Tribune
Mayor seeks parking in Railways Ground
The Mayor of Karachi Murtaza Wahab, announced on Tuesday that immediate steps will be taken to improve the traffic system in Saddar and other key areas of the city. Wahab stated that a parking facility accommodating 500 vehicles is to be made operational near Bolton Market after Eid. Further, underground parking adjacent to Polo Ground Baradari, PIDC, and II Chundrigar Road is already open for public use. He further revealed that a request has been submitted to the Governor of Sindh for railway land to be allocated to the KMC, which would resolve parking issues around II Chundrigar Road. Wahab stated that Karachi's daily increase in population and the number of vehicles are causing traffic problems, leading to the wastage of time and fuel, increasing citizens' frustration. To counter this, he urged the traffic police administration to deploy more personnel in high-traffic zones for smooth vehicular movement. He said an efficient traffic management system is crucial so that citizens should park their vehicles in designated parking areas.
