While still in retirement, Google’s former head of search Amit Singhal is joining the board of GOQii, a smart fitness startup that has already launched in India. Unlike other fitness competitors, GOQii is more focused on selling a personal coaching service than actual hardware.
Fitbit didn’t exactly impress the market when it tried to launch a full-blown smartwatch last month, its stock price falling 11% in response to the idea of the company seemingly attempting to compete with the Apple Watch. It may have better luck with its latest offering, a fashion-oriented fitness band called Alta offering five days of battery-life. The emphasis here is on style, the $130 unit available with both leather bands ($60) and stainless steel bracelet ($100).
The Fitbit Alta will be available for pre-order from tomorrow at Amazon, Best Buy, Target, Walmart and other retail sites, with shipping in March or April, depending on configuration.
Via Engadget
Chinese website SOGI.com.tw has posted images of what is purportedly a next-generation Xiaomi Mi Band, reportedly to be called the Mi Band 1s. The only difference we can notice by observing the externals is that it houses a heart rate sensor.
This minor difference would make sense as most Xiaomi hardware is priced incredibly competitively, and anything more than the addition of a heart rate sensor may raise the price more than they’d like. The current Mi Band is available ranging between $15-20 on Mi.com and AliExpress. My only concern is how the sensor will impact battery life, but we’ll have to wait and see.
Have you tried the Mi Band? And if so, do you like it? I personally haven’t tried it, but at such a low price it’s pretty hard to beat. Unless of course you already have a smartwatch or other fitness band with a heart rate sensor.
If you loved the look of the Withings Activité or Activité Pop watches, but wanted to track your activity data on your Android device, you now can. The company has announced that both watches are now compatible with Android, feeding your activity data (steps, swimming distance and sleep cycles) into Google Fit …
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Motorola announced in a blog post today its all-in-one fitness band is about to get a new update. Motorola said it would detail more as the launch date of the update comes closer, but it did reveal that the MOTOACTV would gain support for up to 40 new activities, including: yoga, Pilates, dancing and martial arts. Motorola will also roll out an online hub —where users can track fitness progress—at the time of the update. The MOTOACTV band will push the fitness information over Wi-Fi, so you can then setup competitions among friends.
Just as a refresher: Motorola announced the MOTOACTV at an event in October along with the Droid RAZR. The MOTOACTV can track your every move, play music through an FM radio, and can even store up to 4,000 songs. The 8GB version retails for $210 and the 16GB version retails for $300. Stay tuned, as Motorola said there is more to come.
