More iWatch leaks from Apple, this time to the Wall Street Journal. Now comes the unsurprising news that 1) the iWatch's display will be curved and with an OLED screen, and 2) the iWatch will include an NFC chip to allow contactless payments. The NFC news is only slightly surprising, and less so in light of a recent drumbeat of news reports that Apple's been talking with … [Read more...]
Is This The Granddaddy of All Wearables Patents?
An email just landed in our inbox about US Patent 8,823,512, issued yesterday to one Donald Spector. Mr. Spector has a long list of inventions to his credit. But this one claims a patent for, well, read the abstract: A system and method for monitoring the state of an individual, in which a biological sensor is attached to the individual, and a wireless transmitter is attached … [Read more...]
iWatch Won’t Ship Until 2015. Or Maybe It Will.
The guy who pegged September 9 as the date for the new Apple product roll-out (and how sad is it that that qualifies as a scoop?) is now saying that the iWatch (or whatever it's called) will be shown then but won't ship until 2015. Let's say it's true. The thing is: it doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter to Apple, surely. No wearable is going to make a significant … [Read more...]
Self Promotion: Health Tech Insider on ZDNet
Alfred Poor, the editor of our sister publication HealthTechInsider.com, was interviewed the other day by ZDNet's David Gerwitz. The piece is up, and well worth watching. [youtube https://youtu.be/GfCyZjyBJ_k] … [Read more...]
Jawbone Tracks Quake Response
Jawbone has produced a chart that demonstrates that the closer you are to a magnitude 6.1 earthquake, the more likely you are to wake up and move: Obvious, yes, but also interesting. First of all, it's a cool illustration of the uses of aggregated data; Jawbone checked the sleep data collected by its UP wearers and saw these interesting patterns. … [Read more...]
Noonee Chairless Chair Exoskeleton Lets You Sit Anywhere
The Swiss startup Noonee is building a device that straps onto your legs and shoes, and lets you sit down anywhere you want. The company pitches it as a "posture support device," which has a nice ring to it. The thing is a five-pound carbon fiber and aluminum device that you put behind your legs; it's jointed at the knees and has pads at the buttocks. You can assume whatever … [Read more...]
Smartband Business Jumped 684 Pct This Year, Says Canalys
Fitbit, Jawbone, and Samsung are leading the smartband business, says the industry analysis shop Canalys, whose earlier work has impressed us. On a worldwide basis, the smartband market grew 684 percent from 1H13 to 1H14 -- although Canalys doesn't say if that's units shipped or revenue. Due to their relationships with distributors, Fitbit and Jawbone lead the basic … [Read more...]
Ralph Lauren Brands OMSignal Shirts at the US Open
Is it possible that a major fashion brand is actually embracing the function of wired clothing? The NYTimes says Ralph Lauren is branding OMSignal's instrumented compression shirts at the US Open, the tennis tournament that opens today in New York City. The shirts aren't going on the players, who are probably quite well instrumented during their training already. Rather, the … [Read more...]
Intel Uses Wearables to Track Rhinos
We're always suckers for a good application story, and this one qualifies: Intel is using its wearable Galileo motherboard to track endangered black rhinoceroses in South Africa and save them from poachers. This entails attaching devices to the rhino, which gives rise to our favorite sentence of the week: Attempting to affix technology to a rhino is risky. Yeah. … [Read more...]
Tennis Star Andy Murray Speaks on Wearables
Andy Murray is Britain's top tennis player, currently ranked 9th in the world, and is seeded 8th in next week's US Open. He gave an e-mail interview to Smithers Apex in advance of that company's Wearable Technology UX conference in September; he talked about what professional athletes already have in terms of data and what they need, and how wearables in sports might change the … [Read more...]