It began with a revolutionary idea
With his invention of the HYPOXI-Method, sport scientist Dr. Norbert Egger laid the foundations for an entirely new category of body shaping. After graduating from the University of Salzburg, he rounded off his competences with extensive advanced trainings in the areas of rehabilitation and health training. In 1983, he founded Austria’s first fitness and health studio for women in Salzburg.
Over the course of the years, however, he noticed that many women weren’t able to get to grips with their problem areas, neither with intensive exercise nor with all kinds of changes in diet. As a sport scientist, he knew that fat is burned primarily in regions where the tissue is best supplied with blood and above all, fat is burned by movement.
He already used targeted circulation-enhancing methods such as vacuum massage and lymphatic drainage to reduce water retention to tighten the skin, in his studio. Based on these insights, he now focussed on developing training devices which would combine circulation-enhancing methods with movement. He used the first prototype of a HYPOXI device in 1997, with completely surprising results – even for himself! For the first time in history, pressure therapy was used simultaneous with fat burning exercise: the beginning of the HYPOXI-Method and an entirely new impulse for the body shaping industry!
With a small but motivated team, he first developed a pressure-resistant device which, whilst closely surrounding the body, still left enough freedom of movement for real exercise. The HYPOXI-Training device was now ready for deployment and proved to be THE innovation at international fitness and beauty trade shows. The egg-shaped pressure chamber in which the problem areas are “put under pressure” during cycle training fascinated the entire industry.
In 1998, Dr. Egger founded the Hypoxi Produktions- und Vertriebs GmbH and with it the first company in the fitness industry that focused on systematic body shaping. With consistent further development and the HYPOXI-Method, which today is unique around the world, Dr Norbert Egger had his international breakthrough.
Today, HYPOXI is active in over 50 countries worldwide. Hundreds of thousands of people have benefitted from Egger’s idea, and he led the company himself until 2006. In April 2008, Dr. Norbert Egger passed away at only 50 years of age.
Subsequently, his long-time friend, fellow student and co-developer of many years, Bernd Eckerstorfer, managed the company in the spirit of its founder, together with an international team of competent and passionate employees.
Since 2021, Uwe Hintringer and Bernd Eckerstorfer have led the company as managing partners.