Digital Lifescapes

The Internet of Things (IoT) includes small devices that create a constant steam of data that needs to be captured and interpreted as actionable insight. This use case is especially important within the healthcare sector, where the ongoing analysis of data can be applied to improve a person's life. The gradual change in direction for fitness wearables to become essential healthcare devices will lead to over 75 million Americans using dedicated activity trackers by 2021 -- that's over double the current user base, according to the latest market study by Juniper Research. Healthcare Wearable Market Development The new research has found that this shift in focus will help to alter the consumer perception of wearable trackers, making them seem more necessary to achieving and maintaining good health -- and potentially lower healthcare expenses, based upon lifestyle choices. Vendors like Fitbit, Withings and Misfit are leading this change, making integration with medical data...

More people are wearing new personal activity tracking devices. According to the latest market study by The NPD Group, annual 2015 unit sales of connected activity trackers experienced impressive growth of 85 percent versus 2014 -- that's despite a hike in the average selling price (ASP) from $96 to $109. "The increase in ASP speaks to these devices becoming more sophisticated, and that consumers are looking for better-quality devices, not just entry-level products," said Ben Arnold, executive director at The NPD Group . "This, combined with unit growth, shows that prices aren't falling to drive demand -- demand is increasing along with rising prices." Fitbit remained the leading brand in connected activity trackers in 2015, accounting for 79 percent of sales. The company has been the market leader in connected activity trackers since 2014, growing market share by more than 20 points since that time -- despite the entrance of new competing products in th...

Activity tracker shipments continued to grow in 2015 -- up almost 80 percent over 2014. Shipment totals will top 87 million in 2021 as these devices continue to lead consumers into the emerging wearable wireless connected health and well-being market, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. "Activity trackers are the current vanguard device for bringing consumers into connected medical services,” said Jonathan Collins, principal analyst at ABI Research . "As they continue to proliferate, they will spur greater investment in mHealth device development and adoption, as well as the services that can help bring the data these devices collect into health care provision." Essential Network Platforms and Infrastructure Despite the increasing popularity of activity trackers, the professional medical device market still awaits the shift to connected devices that has been underway in the consumer fitness market over the past few years. Connected medical devic...

ABI Research reports that activity trackers dominated sales of smart wearable devices in Q1 2014, outselling much-hyped smart watches by 4 to 1 -- with 2.35 million devices shipped during the period. Fitbit remains the market leader, with a majority share, but will face growing competition in Q2 2014 and over the course of the year, especially with Samsung about to launch the hybrid Samsung Gear Fit. "Activity Trackers are currently the most viable consumer electronics wearable device category, because they have a clear use case that cannot be matched by smartphones, in contrast to smart watches," said Nick Spencer, senior practice director at ABI Research . People have been happy to ditch their watches and use smartphones to tell the time, so extending smartphone functions to the watch is a weak use case and retrograde step. Smart watch sales dropped significantly in Q1 2014 compared to Q4 2013, due in small part to the seasonal effect of Christmas, but largely due t...