 Live from Las Vegas. Expecting the signal from the noise. It's theCUBE, covering InterConnect 2016. Brought to you by IBM. Okay, welcome back everyone. We are here live in Las Vegas for IBM InterConnect 2016. This is SiliconANGLE's exclusive coverage. This is theCUBE, our flagship program. We go out to the events and extract the signal from the noise. I'm John Furrier with two great guests here. Really great story. Jason Jacobs, who's the founder and CEO of RunKeeper, fitness application platform. Just recently sold. Congratulations. And Simon Weecroff, adventurer, among other things. Been legally blind since 17 and has done some amazing things. Quite an interesting story. We're going to talk about how technology enables the spirit of happiness and pursuit for people to do stuff. Great story, Simon. Thank you for coming on. Jason, thanks for coming on. I really appreciate you sitting in the time. Thank you. Thank you for having us. So everyone wants to know that I want to go to the next level. Then we had a lot of athletes at this show talking about technology, technology innovation to augment their life. And we see augmented reality, you see virtual reality, all these things happen. But you know, those people see, those people can see Simon. They can actually see the screens. Yeah. You're having trouble seeing. So how has this worked for you? Share with your story, with the audience, where you were and how the fitness app helped you and your story. Well, Runkeeper came along at a real ideal moment in my life. I was in a point in time where I was incredibly frustrated with losing my sight. I felt I got to a point where I was beginning to limit what I was doing because I couldn't see. And I felt that wasn't really a way to progress. So around this time I was looking for a way to go out there and challenge myself and really push. And I lived near some football pitches, some soccer pitches in my house. And I positioned myself between the goalposts. I just went up and down a soccer pitch. And at the same time, I began using Jason's app. And Jason's app was the first one to give audio cues. So rather than having to look at a screen, for the first time I got the information to audio. So it would say how far I'd run and how fast. And then I took that information and decided to see if I could pair the distance cue to what it felt like underfoot and just begin to memorize a route on the open road. So you basically have a route, you basically routed the data on cues. You mapped it yourself in your mind's eye. Yeah, you make a few mistakes a lot of the way. The open door. I used to run into lampposts and road signs and things like that, but then you'd remember where those were, sort of pair that with a distance marker and one keeper and then just continue to build up the route. So it took me a couple of months to build up a three mile route with the aid of one keeper. That's awesome. Great inspiration. And Jason, I'm sure this is not a use case on the startup pitch, but this is a great example of some of the things that you're passionate about in your entrepreneur. You just recently sold your company to ASICS. Congratulations. Thank you. Super validates. You got to know your young family too. It's good as well. Keep them fed in college, make some money. But more importantly, talk about your story because this is not how you saw it or was it? How did you see this happening with your app? Yeah. So I mean, I think one thing about Runkeeper is that a lot of people assume that it was started by a competitive, serious ultra performance runner and was built for people like that. But the reality is that I'm just kind of a regular guy. I mean, I played a year and two games of Division III hockey in college and quit and played intramurals for the rest of my time and was always into things like lifting weights. And when I stopped playing sports, I started running as a way to just kind of hold it all together and actually after college, I'd only worked in small high-growth technology companies and was addicted to building these small high-growth technology companies and said, I know this is what I want to do my whole career and ultimately I want to start and build a company myself. And I was looking in areas that I knew but not necessarily areas that I was passionate about and I didn't really know what I was passionate about other than building these technology companies and it all just kind of came full circle because I signed up for my first marathon as a way to basically like spark my creative juices because I was so frustrated with this grueling process to try to figure out what kind of company to start. And this big epiphany for me was that, aha, it's been staring me in the face. Fitness is what I'm passionate about. I've been passionate about fitness my whole life. It's a huge part of who I am. I want to build a fitness technology company and I want to help regular people like me to get and stay motivated around fitness and sport. So, I mean, on the one hand, Simon is just what we, an example of just what we set out to do in terms of helping people to get and stay motivated around sport. But did we know that we could enable someone to overcome the kind of hurdles that Simon has overcome on that quest? We had no idea and it's just absolutely amazing to see and really humbling as well. And Simon has been a big inspiration not only for me but for my whole team as well. When we have hard days, we just think about what Simon is able to do and it's very motivating for us. Simon, the mindset of a growth mindset, I always, when I talk to my kids, I try to give advice with them because they're not listening to their teenagers, but be a growth mindset. Really, I mean, you face some adversity. It must have been a real bummer, like, man, and then all of a sudden, take us through some of those key points in your life and how you felt and then how the technology and was it one big motivational push or was it a series of incremental, like, I mean, you run into a lamppost. I mean, did you really run into a lamppost? I mean, that's, there's a lot of reasons to tap out of that. Yeah. Take us through some of those. I suppose one of the really important points was the point where I quit doing something because I couldn't see. I was trying to climb half-dome in Yosemite and the idea was to get to the top before it's my girlfriend. She'd say, yes, it'd be a fantastic romantic. But it turned out climbing half-dome was harder than I thought. I'd never tried to climb a mountain before. And I was beginning to sleep and trip. And yeah, I quit doing something because I couldn't see. And that was really difficult to live with. So then returned to the UK and realized and I'd quit because I couldn't see. It was so hard. And I'd told myself that, you know, I'd never quit again. Even if it was because I couldn't see, that was just nothing. So you had it inside your soul. You're like, you know what? I'm gonna, I'm not gonna lay down. Absolutely. And then I sort of applied that more generally, saying even if, you know, in times get hard, you know, it's no reason to quit. You know, gotta keep pushing, keep moving forward. And it was difficult the first few times. I went out and I really can't sort of point out just how much the app made the difference because it was a real lady's voice. Cat, is it? Cat, is it his voice? Is that helpful? The new revenue we've given feedback? Yeah, just hearing her voice every sort of couple of minutes was a real motivator in it. Filming full of confidence and I'd wait for the next sort of update from Cat, which really made me believe even more. And yeah, you know, I did run into the lamppost. I really did hurt. You did run into a lamppost. Yeah, a couple of times I got hit by a van and, you know, you stand my cup and you keep on moving forward and you don't stop. And then when I went for my first ever ultra, there was a really difficult moment where I'd trained on a pancake flight airport. So I'd never run a hill in my life because there's just no hills where I'd memorized. But unfortunately I'd picked out a race that turned out was really hilly because I couldn't see the elevation gain map on the website. So I had no idea it was hilly. I thought it'd be flat, it's a road. So I turned up to this race and after 50 miles my legs were just destroyed. Emotionally I was falling apart, I was just crying and I sat down and I thought back to when I'd promised myself that I'd never quit. But there's a difference between quitting and failure. And I told myself that I'm happy to fail and the only way I was going to fail is if I could no longer stand. So I stood back up and 33 more miles until I could no longer stand. And then I got to be moved from the race. But then I just saw that as any other failures except for all the lessons learned. And from that point on, you know, I've never had to... They carried you off the race. Yeah. Yeah. So you got up after 50, ran another 30. 33, yeah. 33. And all on the hills. So like you had like your body felt the hills. You must have been like, oh, what's going on? What's going to stop? Will you have those motions going on? Yeah, you know, it really is an emotional roller coaster. You're up and down and a lot of the time when you're doing the bigger distances, it's all about managing your emotions and staying in control. And, you know, it's the same when I'm doing the training. You know, I've got to stay in control all the time. So if I make a mistake, go like two steps to the left, I'm going to get hit by a car. And the cars are going like 70 miles an hour. So I've always got to really manage emotions, stay in control, try never to make any mistakes. So was the technology the augmented reality for you was compelling, obviously? What's there a moment where you knew right away with the app? Did you have like, oh, I'll just try this out. Tire kicking? Was it like? Yeah, it was a definite moment because it started on the soccer pitch and the soccer pitch was essentially easy. It's, you can't really go about, just run up and down. But the only reason I stopped is because of the dog walkers. So I just couldn't see them. And, you know, they assumed I would move. They thought they'd move. It was a strange chicken with someone who can't see them. Yeah, someone did that to me the other day. I just won't have that one in. I was absolutely plowed into them because they didn't move. You go to New York, no one's moving. You certainly run over people if you go to New York. But the definitive moment with the app was on a closed road. And I was using double yellow lines and I could feel the lines underfoot. And the app, I just so happened to configure it to do three minutes. And now my pace perfectly matched 0.3 miles. I'd hit these greats underfoot. And it was at that point in time, I thought maybe I can take this and really go with it and memorize the rule. So you saw the pattern, okay, wow, this is actually workable. Yeah. And then from there it was just, you're in. Yeah, there was a, I suppose another definitive moment where you're running this closed road and then at the stop, it's a dual carriageway, which is like a freeway interstate sort of thing. So I was running the closed road and then there was this one day where I knew I just had to step onto that road and just keep on going. So I was running up and down, trying to build up my confidence, waiting for Kat to tell me how far I'd gone. And eventually I did build up the confidence and I just told myself in my head that cars move, they will not want to hit you. They will move. So then with that sort of, as a mantra. You basically went out there and bet that the cars would move. No one wants to hit you. Yeah, I know. That's a good leap of faith. Hope the parachute opens and you jump off that of the plane. Well, no one does want to run you over and I just told myself that, because no one really wants to do that. As long as you're paying attention, that's not going to happen. So I just told myself that that's what's going to happen. That is what's going to happen. And I just went out onto the road and I did it. But then, you know, you can always stay in this invincible mindset for a very small amount of time. So I think it's probably about 0.5 miles where it like turns around the corner a little bit. So I got to that bit and I just burst into tears because the mindset could only stay real for a short space of time. But then the mindset doesn't need to exist anymore because then you've built up on confidence in your ability that you no longer need to believe that you need to be invincible and things move because you're so confident and you practice the rule. You get used to the software. So it really was an immersive augmented reality for you. Certainly, you're there. What's happened since? I mean, any new updates, any new innovations to your usage and new adventures that share some thoughts around what you're doing now? Yeah, well, the next big step is something that I've been contemplating for years now. And I learned to train solo, which was a fantastic achievement. I did go over to sort of the ultra distance and my favorite adventure was I ran from Jason's headquarters in Boston all the way to the start line of New York, Madison and around the Marathon. So that still remains one of the best adventures just because it felt like a bit of a pilgrimage to get into. I feel like home. Yeah, for us too. Get into me, the team, because I've never met these people in real life. I'd heard Kat's voice so much. I'd never met Jason, which was okay. Is Kat a real person on your team? So Kat, so when she created the audio cues, she was the girlfriend of our CTO and they're now married, so. And Kat is still Kat, so she's a real person. She got license on a whole row. She signed that. A Siri voice. I mean, that's the voice in your ear. That was a helpful thing for you. That was a real compelling reason, wasn't it? Yeah, and I think perhaps it was a human voice made it more real. Yeah, and I don't want to tell Simon this, so Simon cover your ears, but at some point we might have some voice alternatives, maybe some other options besides Kat. So Kat will still stay, she'll still be there. She'll still be there. She'll stay with the girls. We'll get her on a freelancing basis. She'll come in, do some personal control. She'll just call me, we'll just talk. How's it going, you know, coaching? Yeah, he doesn't need run cupries. He's just going to call Kat when he goes out and she can be in his ear. But the next step is to now compete solo. And that's just a case of finding the right location. The right location is the desert. So I'm heading out to the Namibian desert in May, and I'm going to try and do it on guided solo, just me. And I'm developing an app with IBM Bluemix and we're going to see if it's possible for me to compete solo. I mean, all this new technology around real time and streaming is actually going to help, I think, a lot. Jason, I got to ask you, your team, obviously the motivational factors of what Simon's done has probably been an inspiration for everybody. I know it's for me here in the story of others watching and you mentioned this for you. How has it impacted your team's growth, their mindset, new product development? Has there been an impact to that? Yeah, I mean, to be honest, I think when we started the company, we kind of had, we had a germ of an idea that we wanted to just help people no matter where they are on their journey to get out and stay motivated around the sport. But we didn't really have a clear sense of brand and self. And over the years, we've really kind of tightened and figured out who we are. And what we stand for as a brand is that, I mean, our mission is to get the whole world running. And as a brand, what we stand for is helping regular people do exceptional things. And you, I mean, no offense Simon, but you're a regular person, other than you're, of course, you're a disability, right? And you're doing exceptional things. So it's like you couldn't possibly be more representative of the brand we're trying to build or how we're trying to inspire people. And so we think about that all the time. Like we, and I, I mean, even as an entrepreneur, this is my first company, I'm seven and a half years in, it has had ups and downs and highs and lows. And it's been a long journey and I love it, but huge sacrifices and things like that along the way. And I personally think about your journey all the time as an inspiration to me. Not so much in my running because you kick my butt at running, but when I'm, you know, building the company because that's the only thing I can even, that even scratches the surface of the hurdles that Simon's had to overcome. So we had Neil Henderson on, he was with the performance cycling team with Apex coaching and they have the device, the glasses. So you're running solo with Blue Mix. You could be not so solo, by the way, you could be, they could be tracking your every move. I think maybe, I don't know if that's on the horizon, but you know, there's other ways to also help you. Yeah. That's also pretty dangerous to go out solo in the desert. Yeah, you got to survive in the desert as well. So I've got to take all my own food and sleeping equipment and everything. So it's not just a case of running solo. I've also got to try and... How about half dome? You're going to go back to half dome? I mean, it is a very beautiful place, but it's dangerous. It's very grueling, by the way, too. Yeah, I would like to go back and I think I'm going to wait because I've got two sons now. So I think I'm going to wait until they're a little older and then try... I wouldn't do half dome solo. Now El Capitan, that would be, that's your next one too. You can get, you know, free climbing El Capitan. Is there a nap for that? There are a few blind climbers, but yeah, I'm not very... No, no, don't. You've got two kids. My wife won't let me climb El Capitan. I've got four kids or jump out of an airplane. So there's things I can't do. I'm the anti-adventurer. You know, you've got two kids. Jason, where did you play hockey? Well, I played in high school and I went to Wesleyan University. I played for a year and two games. So you can kind of count that as playing college. Are you from the Boston area? Yeah, born and raised in Boston. Just at a suburb of Boston called Newton. Okay, yeah. I used to live in Redding. Dave Vellante lives in Harvard. Guys, thanks so much for sharing your story. Simon, I'm going to give you the last word. Share with the folks out there who are watching who look at your story and say, wow, it's an inspiration. But also people who might be phobia of technology, you know, because there's the geeks like me who love to play with augmented reality and looking all the tech. I bought Google Glass right off the first line. The guys in there at Google I.O., I love tech. But there's people like, hey, you know what? I'm not, I don't really want to be on Facebook. I don't like tech. How can that help them? So one, the inspirational piece of never give up your thoughts on that whole mindset. And two, how technology can help them. Yeah, never giving up is a pretty important mindset. It was something that was intuitive. You know, I didn't just all of a sudden have it. It was a slow gradual process and then the ups and the downs. And you do build on it. And I suppose it's that acceptance of some days are harder than others, but you just keep moving forward. It's moving forward to make a big difference. Soon as you start, put your life on pause. You know, that's where it all starts to fall apart. Keep moving, keep moving. Keep moving. How about technology? Not worrying about the technology for the phobia folks out there. Technology for me has been the ultimate enabler because essentially I can't even read a book. Now, there's a lot of things in my life now that without technology, I wouldn't even be able to function. You know, imagine not being able to read anymore and not look at your computer and read a website or pick up a magazine or a newspaper. You lose contact with the world. And it's only thanks to sort of apps being accessible and phones that, you know, I can now communicate like using things like WhatsApp. Because WhatsApp for me has been a fantastic step forward. Could you send audio messages? Because typing can be quite difficult when you can't see. So technology is a fantastic enabler and it's definitely not something to be scared of. It's something that can be adapted and really change your life. That's awesome. Well, thanks for coming on theCUBE. Really appreciate it. Jason, thank you for much for your story. This is theCUBE telling the stories here inside theCUBE here at IBM Interconnect 2016. Moving back with more after this short break.