Withings on Sunday announced a suite of new wearables and what it claims is the world’s smartest cardiovascular monitor, having debuted its latest products as part of its Consumer Electronics Show appearance in Las Vegas, Nevada. The additions to the company’s wearable portfolio come in the form of the Move and Move ECG, with the former being a range of conventional smartwatches, whereas the latter encompasses analog timepieces infused with support for medical-grade electrocardiogram readings.
An ECG for your wrist
The Move ECG is the flagship part of the new product range, featuring a $129.95 price tag and a premium design coupled with a choice between black and white bodies, as well as a wide variety of bands. The former Nokia unit is presently trying to have the device approved by the FDA and CE in order to provide consumers with written guarantees of their medical effectiveness, with the plan being to have the Move ECG start retailing in the second quarter of the year.
Outside of the on-demand electrocardiogram which utilizes three electrodes for consistent accuracy and takes under 30 seconds to do its thing, the Move ECG also offers day-long activity tracking and is highly automated in nature, being capable of automatically recognizing various workouts for maximum convenience. A 12-month battery is also part of the package, together with waterproofing that allows the Move ECG to survive being submerged up to 50 meters underwater. The wearable can leverage your smartphone’s GPS connectivity in order to provide geographical context to your activity data, in addition to supporting sleep pattern tracking and a “Smart Wake-Up” function allowing you to get out of bed in a relatively comfortable manner.
Affordability is the new name of the game
The rest of the Move range is significantly more affordable, featuring a recommended price tag of $69.95. The lack of an integrated electrocardiogram also allows the standard models to offer up to 18 months of battery life, with the lineup itself being positioned as sort of a spiritual follow up to the Activité product family which debuted four years ago. Much like that particular portfolio, the Withings Move devices aim to blend stylish design with robust activity tracking, an intuitive user interface, and many quality-of-life features. The timepieces themselves are analog, which allows them to make the most of their battery, so the fitness-tracking aspect of the new range is hence heavily reliant on a smartphone connection.
Withings still sought to present some fitness information to users even without a handset connection, which is why one of the three Move dials shows user activity progression which ranges from 0 to 100 and is a highly contextual measurement of workouts and general goals. The 38mm watch will be available in combination with five bands starting from February 5 in the United States. Both the Move and Move ECG are also planned to be released globally but their launch dates may differ depending on the market, much like their price tags. The initial five models of the smart analog watch will be expanded over the course of this year, both with new bands and bodies, Withings said, albeit without providing concrete details on the matter. Other than lacking electrocardiogram support, the Move line is extremely similar to the Move ECG and features the same fitness-tracking capabilities and sleep monitoring the more expensive gadget does. Withings believes the range caters to a wide variety of consumers and should hence do well in the digital health segment moving forward.
World’s smartest cardiovascular monitor
The final addition to Withings’ product portfolio announced at this year’s CES is the BPM Core, a consumer-grade cardiovascular monitor described as the most sophisticated and intelligent gadget of its kind ever created. While clinically accurate blood pressure monitoring has been available to consumers for many years now, the BPM Core builds on that foundation with the addition of ECG support and a built-in digital stethoscope designed to help users listen to their heart in search for irregularities that could be indicative of health issues. The versatile gadget is meant to be the ultimate heart disease prevention tool in the digital health industry over the course of 2019, with Withings planning to release it in the second quarter of the year, priced at $249.95 in the U.S.