Bodyswaps AI & VR Soft Skills Roleplay Simulations

Bodyswaps was co-founded in 2020 by Christophe Mallet, Tom Szirtes and Julien Denoel, building on work that began in 2019 under the name Somewhere Else. It has offices in London and Raleigh, North Carolina, and helps universities, colleges, healthcare educators and employers build communication, employability and leadership skills that are hard to practise at scale.

The platform offers AI-built roleplay simulations where learners speak with virtual characters and receive instant feedback and an AI coaching reflection. It is organised into Practice, Assess and Deploy: educators create custom roleplays, track individual and cohort progress, and run live or self-paced sessions on desktop, browser, mobile or VR headsets without installs. More than 100 ready modules cover communication and job skills, and the platform connects to Moodle, Canvas, Blackboard and other LTI 1.3 systems. It is used by 350+ campuses and partners, including NHS, Yale, Cornell, UCL and King's College London.

• AI roleplay builder: educators generate custom roleplays aligned to their curriculum.
• Spoken practice with virtual characters: learners talk through realistic scenarios and get instant feedback.
• AI coaching reflection: each session ends with guided reflection on performance.
• Assessment dashboards: individual and cohort progress tracking with learner analytics and class management.
• Multi-device delivery: desktop, browser, mobile and VR headsets for live or self-paced sessions.
• LMS integration: Moodle, Canvas, Blackboard and any LTI 1.3 system.

• Universities in Vietnam running job-interview and workplace communication practice for final-year students.
• Nursing and medical schools training patient communication and breaking bad news.
• Banks and service companies coaching frontline staff on difficult customer conversations.

• Practice at scale: every learner can rehearse difficult conversations repeatedly without booking actors or trainers.
• Confidence and engagement: 90% of surveyed educators say it builds student confidence and 91% say it increases engagement.
• Flexible access: the same roleplays run in a browser, on mobile or in VR headsets, with no install required.
• Easy trial and rollout: a 14-day free trial and LMS connection through LTI 1.3 lower adoption effort.

Employers consistently report soft-skill gaps among graduates, and healthcare educators need more communication practice than clinical placements can provide. AI conversation engines and affordable VR headsets now make realistic roleplay practice available to every learner. Vietnamese universities, nursing schools and corporate training teams are looking for scalable ways to build communication and employability skills, including in English.

Co-founded in 2020 (origins in 2019 as Somewhere Else); offices in London and Raleigh, North Carolina. Partnered with Meta on a healthcare education grant covering 163 US institutions in 2025. Aligned with WCAG 2.2 AA accessibility. Users include NHS, Yale, Cornell, Columbia, UCL, King's College London and University of Toronto.