The Finnish smart fabric company Clothing+ was bought earlier this month by Florida-based Jabil Circuit, an NYSE-traded company (NYSE: JBL) that does electronics prototyping and manufacturing. Clothing+, which made the sensor fabric in the Victoria's Secret smart bra, has been in business for 17 years, integrating electronics into textiles. Its first heart monitor shirt was … [Read more...]
Google X Shows Health Tracking Wristband
Google is apparently working on a health-related wristband, but don't expect to be able to buy it anytime soon -- or ever. Bloomberg is carrying a story about a wristband from Google X -- the research division of Google -- that will be able to measure pulse rate, heart rhythm, skin temperature, and local environment. It won't be sold to people, but rather distributed to … [Read more...]
Fitbit IPO Prices at $20, Opens at $30 (Last Update)
Here we go. Fitbit was the first IPO of the Wearables Era, and it went pretty smoothly. The stock, priced at $20, hit the NYSE at a touch above $30, had a big trade at nearly $32 (making some friend of an underwriter about a $10 million profit for just existing), and then settled within a couple of pennies of $30 for the rest of the day. By 10:30 am, pretty much all the … [Read more...]
Intel Acquires Recon Instruments
Intel continues its sweep into the consumer wearables market, acquiring Recon Instruments for a reported $175 million. Recon is big in the sports segment of the augmented reality market, making the tech guts of an Oakley ski visor, as well as its own Snow2 and Jet glasses and the Engage smartphone app. Intel was an investor in Recon through its Intel Capital wing, and … [Read more...]
Fitbit Ups the Ante, Raising Target IPO Price
Tomorrow, Fitbit becomes the first pure wearables company to go public, and today increased its target price (and amount of money it expects to raise) when its shares go on sale. Previously, the company said it expected that just shy of 30 million shares of stock would open at between $14 and $16, for a corporate valuation of about $3.1 billion. Today, a financial filing … [Read more...]
TE Connectivity Helps Make Google’s Jacquard Work
Building electronics requires a clean and controlled environment. Building clothes is a messy business. Creating a workflow that accommodates both is one of the trickier parts of Google's Project Jacquard, and the connectivity and sensor maker TE Connectivity says it played a part in that. They're not sharing a ton of details, but TE says they collaborated with Google to … [Read more...]
12 Million Augmented Reality Glasses Will Ship by 2020, Says Tractica
The market research firm Tractica estimates that 12 million units of "smart augmented reality glasses" will ship in the next five years. The company counts everything from Google Glass to Oculus Rift and Magic Leap, so they don't seem to be making much of a distinction based on use case. Nonetheless, Tractica estimates that 114,000 units of AR glasses will ship this year, … [Read more...]
Fitbit Prices IPO at $14 to $16, Raising $350M at $3.1B Valuation
Fitbit has updated its S-1 filing, preparatory to going public, saying it expects to price the nearly 40 million shares it will sell at between $14 and $16. Of the shares going on the market, 22.4 million of them are being sold by the company; the other 7.5 million are being sold by existing shareholders. At the midpoint of the selling price, the IPO will add $336 million to … [Read more...]
Google’s Project Soli Rethinks Interaction
Google took the wraps off Project Soli during its Google I/O developer conference, quietly introducing a highly sensitive motion sensor that could reshape how we interact with close-range devices. We've seen radar signals used in various ways, and generally in much larger sizes and forms than what Google unveiled at I/O. Project Soli, Google says, marks the first time radar … [Read more...]
What to Expect From Levi’s Deal with Google
A fashion designer at Google's annual I/O developer conference? Inconceivable. But with the unveiling of Project Jacquard, Google's touch-enabled material, it suddenly makes sense that Paul Dillinger, Levi Strauss’s head of global product innovation. could be seen wandering amidst developers. After all, the world of apps and fashion are about to collide, and Levi's will be … [Read more...]