We're hearing about the Airo fitness band, which claims to track activity, sleep, stress, and even what you eat by looking at your bloodstream. The plan is to build an aluminum band with some soft material on the skin side, and to sync through smartphones. From their FAQ: We've built proprietary technology that uses different wavelengths of light to look into the blood … [Read more...]
Open Source Wristwear: the Angel
Hardware is expensive to develop; software is cheap. That's why the Angel sensor, an open source fitness band, has the potential for being extremely important. The Angel is raising money on Indiegogo, and (as of this writing) has raised more than $200,000 of its original $100,000 goal, with 9 days to go. So the thing is a hit. Or, at least, there'll be enough money to get … [Read more...]
Samsung Gear To Play Well With More Tablets
One of the biggest raps, among the many, against the Samsung Gear smartwatch is that it's an add-on device that would only work with one Samsung tablet. Samsung's now fixing that -- a little -- by expanding the roster of devices. When the Samsung Galaxy S4,S III and Note II get their updates to Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean), the company says they'll be able to work with the Gear. … [Read more...]
iWatch Watch
Apple made quite a lot of product announcements yesterday, some of them pretty cool. They updated everything except phones (which they did last mont), iPods, Mac minis, and iMacs. No iWatch. No surprise. Move along, everybody. Nothing to see here. … [Read more...]
More Wearables from Austin
So, of course, as soon as we posted a piece about the Austin tech scene, we heard about another couple of startups worth mentioning down there: The Atlas wristband is a training tool that not only tracks your workout but can figure out what exercise you're doing: curls, squats, shoulder presses, and more. Because it tracks motion in three dimensions, the gear/software can … [Read more...]
CIO on MobileCon Panel
CIO Magazine's Al Sacco -- a talented and reliable reporter -- has a nice piece on a wearables panel at the MobileCon show this week. There are a bunch of good takeaways, so the whole article is worth your time. Most notable: Reliance on smartphones will take a few years to get over. "It doesn't always make sense to replicate the sensors in phones," said an exec at Basis … [Read more...]
Adidas Joins the Smartwatch Crowd
First Fitbit, then Nike. Now Adidas has announced its own smartwatch, the miCoach Smart Run. As its name implies, the Smart Run is aimed at runners, not a general fitness audience, so it competes more with products from Garmin or Basis than Fitbit or Nike. That would help explain its $399 price. The Smart Run includes a GPS tracker and a heart rate sensor (as well as a … [Read more...]
Nike & Fitbit Refresh Wristwear
Nike on Tuesday revealed the Fuelband SE, a refresh to the original Fuelband. They're taking orders now for release on November 6. From the looks of it, most of the changes are in software -- a slightly updated look, closer tracking of training and intense exercise intervals, and tweaks to the social aspects. The SE hardware now uses Bluetooth 4.0, to update the iOS app … [Read more...]
FILIP: Kids’ first smartphone
Kids are being raised with (by?) phones and pads. Kids, inevitably, want their own way before they're ready. As a parenting tool, they can be useful, as a way to stay in touch and monitor where the kids have gotten themselves to. But only a loon would hand a little kid an expensive phone and expect the phone to survive. FILIP is an interesting middle ground. It's a big … [Read more...]
Basis raises another $11.75m; opens store
Basis Science, which makes the Basis health-tracking watch, says it's raised another $11.75 million in its Series B funding round, GigaOm reports, bringing the total for the round to $23.25 million. Total funding is now $32.25 million -- not bad for a watch company. And where the Basis device used to be available only by invitation, you can now buy one from the company … [Read more...]