It’s a change of pace this week, as PULSE by Wareable chats to some old friends. The key highlights of the chat are below, but this one certainly feels like an essential listen, if you’re interested in building and developing wearables.
Misfit was a stalwart of the wearables landscape when Wareable launched in 2014. Its screen-less Misfit Shine was designed to do fitness tracking more beautifully and discreetly than the Fitbits and Nike Fuelbands of its day.
Misfit eventually sold to Fossil, and its DNA is still alive today, with its technology woven through Wear OS after selling IP to Google.
With smart rings bringing digital health minimalism back, I talk to Sonny Vu, founder of Misfit, and Amy Puliafito, its director of communications about the origins and learnings from Misfit – and how wearables are going full circle.
We talk about how Misfit was founded, how crowdfunding played its part, and how Misfit was so successful in its time and place.
And we look at today’s wearables, including Oura, Whoop and Ultrahuman, and talk about why the time for smart rings is now.
In this podcast episode:
00:00: The Early Days of Misfit and the Evolution of Wearables
03:05: Pivoting to Wrist-Worn Wearables
08:11: The Role of Crowdfunding in Misfit's Success
13:31: The Fossil Acquisition and the Challenges of the Wearables Market
25:55: The Current Landscape of the Wearables Industry
28:20: The Challenges and Resurgence of Wearables
37:04: The Rise of Smart Rings
41:42: The Role of Wearables in Healthcare
44:26: The Future of Wearables: New Form Factors and Sensor Ubiquity
49:19: Accelerating Human Learning and Integration with AI
