Alphabet has a new health wearable, but we’ll never see it
Apparently, Alphabet (Google’s parent company) has been working on new health wearables since last year, but don’t have any plans to mass-release them. A reporter from Technology Review visited Alphabet’s Verily spin-off company and was able to get a glimpse at a new lineup of health wearables the company has been working on.
For those unaware, Verily is one of the spin-off divisions from the “X” division within Google. This new division focuses on creating and testing different products before using them in different medical research studies. These wearables include a glucose-sensing contact lens, a cancer-detecting wrist band, and a prototype of the company’s health-tracking watch.
The prototype that was shown off was a “Cardiac and Activity Monitor” and used an e-ink display with a traditional circular display and a digital time readout. The reason for an e-ink display is to help make sure that potential users will be able to wear the health-tracker without worrying about charging it every night, or forgetting it on the charger the next morning.
Other features of the wearable included an outer ring which “measures a person’s electrocardiogram (ECG), or the electrical rhythm of the heart”, and two green LEDs on the underside which also helps to measure the owner’s heart rate. Other than that, no other measurements or specs were given to the reporter due to this product still being under development.
It’s entirely possible, and probable, that we’ll never see these prototypes make it to the masses as Verily’s main focus is the medical research field. However, it’s also possible that Verily will distribute between 10,000 to 20,000 people in a Baseline study that Verily is currently working on.