Aiming to ‘brigge’ the gap

But who with? It’s hard enough finding friends nowadays, much less those who share your interests and have time to accompany you! This was exactly the problem faced by engineering professional Prasanna Jagannathan when he returned from the Silicon Valley, and though he had his brother Sampath Jagannathan with him, they both felt disillusioned at the lack of like-minded company — and decided to take matters into their own hands.

“Hence, came about Brigge! Stand-up comic and theatre artist Murali Satgopan, who is also a family member, came on board, and we all decided to create a social network that would bring about people together — but not with the intention of having them interact virtually — but rather, get them out in the open!” says Prasanna.

Pronounced ‘bridge’, Brigge is an app that not only allows users to find company with activity-based groups, but also create new recreations to attract others. “Some may like to golf; others may ride motorcycles. To give you an idea of the activities planned so far — food walks in Sowcarpet, story-building activities, people getting together to play board games or spikeball on the beach, and terrace-garden enthusiasts meeting up! Even my 60-year-old dad found people his age to discuss books and libraries with. ‘Leisure’ is the one aspect we focus on, but we democratise the medium, and put it in the hands of the people,” he quips.

While other networks seek to keep people on the platform; Brigge’s idea is to facilitate as much real-life interaction as possible. Prasanna adds, “Also, it’s quite simple to use. After downloading the app, people just have to enter their interests like ‘sports and adventure’ and then go to the discovery screen, to connect.