Apple to buy Oura after Amazon launches Halo and Google buys Fitbit?
Is Apple poised to buy Oura, maker of the Oura Ring? Will an acquisition like Oura enable Apple to compete with Amazon and Google for the lucrative prize of health, wellness and fitness data?
What benefits would Oura bring to the Apple ecosystem?
The Oura Ring is a wearable device that tracks various metrics related to sleep, activity, and overall health, exactly the type of continuous health/wellness/fitness data Apple could benefit from in order to build a 'longitudinal view' of users daily habits and behaviours.
Improved sleep: The Oura Ring tracks metrics such as sleep duration, sleep stages, and heart rate variability, which can help users identify factors that may be affecting the quality of their sleep. By making changes to their sleep environment or sleep habits based on the data provided by the Oura Ring, users may be able to improve the quality of their sleep.
Better recovery: The Oura Ring tracks metrics related to heart rate variability, body temperature, and activity levels, which can help users understand how well their bodies are recovering from physical activity or stress. By making adjustments to their activity levels or stress management strategies based on the data provided by the Oura Ring, users may be able to improve their overall recovery.
Increased physical activity: The Oura Ring tracks metrics such as steps taken, calories burned, and active time, which can help users set and achieve fitness goals. By using the data provided by the Oura Ring to track their progress, users may be motivated to increase their physical activity levels and achieve better overall fitness.
Improved overall health: By tracking various metrics related to sleep, activity, and recovery, the Oura Ring provides users with a more comprehensive understanding of their overall health. By making adjustments to their habits based on the data provided by the Oura Ring, users may be able to improve their overall health and wellness.
Overall, the Oura Ring has the potential to provide users with valuable insights into their sleep, activity, and overall health, which can help them make more informed decisions about their habits and lifestyle.
Apple - Oura
Make every workout count by syncing Oura with Apple Health.
You can sync data between Oura and your other health and activity apps by connecting Oura with Apple Health. Enable this connection during your initial setup or later on in your Oura settings.
If workouts imported from Apple Health include calorie data that exceeds Oura’s measures, those calories will be added to Oura’s calorie burn estimates. Imported calorie data cannot be changed in Oura. To edit calorie details, use the original app used to track your workout.
If the imported workout does not include calorie data, you can manually adjust the workout intensity (low, medium, or high) in Oura to better estimate your calorie burn.
Amazon Halo
Halo is Amazon’s new wearable device to compete with Apple Watch and Fitbit.
Amazon’s Halo will compete with Fitbit and Apple Watch, and start-ups like the Oura Ring. But the device not only allows customers to track things like exercise and sleep, which are common in fitness wearables, but can also track emotional changes by listening to the wearer’s tone of voice and can present a 3D body image with a body fat percentage.
Halo has taken the step of putting control of the collected health data in the hands of the individual, not the company that manufactured the device. Halo even includes a one-way hash that prevents other Amazon business units from using Halo data for other business purposes. Both of these are important markers for Amazon to lay down as it launches this new business line.
Google - Fitbit
Rick Osterloh, Senior Vice President, Devices & Services, Google commented in a recent blog:
"Last year, we announced that Google entered into an agreement to acquire Fitbit to help spur innovation in wearable devices and build products that help people lead healthier lives. As we continue to work with regulators to answer their questions, we wanted to share more about how we believe this deal will increase choice, and create engaging products and helpful experiences for consumers.
There's vibrant competition when it comes to smartwatches and fitness trackers, with Apple, Samsung, Garmin, Fossil, Huawei, Xiaomi and many others offering numerous products at a range of prices. We don’t currently make or sell wearable devices like these today. We believe the combination of Google and Fitbit's hardware efforts will increase competition in the sector, making the next generation of devices better and more affordable. This deal is about devices, not data.
We’ve been clear from the beginning that we will not use Fitbit health and wellness data for Google ads.
We recently offered to make a legally binding commitment to the European Commission regarding our use of Fitbit data. As we do with all our products, we will give Fitbit users the choice to review, move or delete their data. And we’ll continue to support wide connectivity and interoperability across our and other companies’ products.
We appreciate the opportunity to work with the European Commission on an approach that addresses consumers' expectations of their wearable devices. We’re confident that by working closely with Fitbit’s team of experts, and bringing together our experience in AI, software and hardware, we can build compelling devices for people around the world."
The Future?
Apple is committed to healthcare in the long term and sees significant market opportunities ahead for the company. Will an acquisition like Oura enable Apple to compete with Amazon and Google for the lucrative prize of health, wellness and fitness data?
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