After wearables, Samsung explores rideables in technology tests on Trek bicycles

CNET reports that Samsung is partnering with bicycle manufacturer Trek and its factory race team to explore the options for integrating the company’s technology into future bicycles.

The company has begun testing some of its mobile products — such as the Galaxy S5, its Gear portfolio, and the Galaxy Note — on the Trek Factory Racing Team as they train for some of the world’s top races, such as the Tour de France. As they ride, the team will monitor their health stats, racing cadence, and speed, along with communicate about team strategies and race routes …

Samsung may find breaking into the market more difficult than it thinks. Garmin is the current king in cycling technology, its GPS devices taking wireless data feeds from heart-rate, cadence and power sensors, and automatically uploading data at the end of the ride to a companion smartphone app and from there onto the web. There are also a huge range of cycling apps that use the GPS and accelerometers built into smartphones to provide a smaller range of data at next to no cost.

Sticking a Galaxy Gear on the handlebars – as in the above photo – isn’t going to cut it. But data communication between bicycles could definitely have potential, both in races and in leisure cycling, making it easier to keep a group together on the road. As a keen cyclist myself, I’ll be watching with interest to see what the company comes up with.