6. Smart Clothing: Wearable Tech

What might be surprising is just how much of this new high-tech clothing is available today. While wearable tech might not be mainstream enough to occupy space in the men’s clothing department at Target, it’s inching closer. (In fact, it’s a big enough business that Amazon has its own Wearable Technology store online.)

The promise of wearable technology is to bring you the advanced functionality found in a typical smartphone or computer app, but incorporated into the things you wear every day. We’re talking the ability to collect, analyze, and display useful and important data without having to pull out your smartphone or notebook PC. It’s data you use, at a glance, keeping your hands free.

Technology-enabled clothing and accessories are made possible because of ongoing advancements in miniaturization. Chips are smaller, sensors are smaller, transmitters are smaller, even displays are smaller than ever before, which means it’s relatively easy to integrate the necessary technology into the form factor of a watch, wristband, or t-shirt. It also helps that technology costs keep decreasing, so that these nifty gadgets continue moving down into the near-affordable range. A smart t-shirt is still going to be more expensive than a plain white tee, but not that much more expensive than the fancy training shirts you find in your favorite sporting goods stores.

Now, few of these wearable devices do more than what you can accomplish with your handy dandy iPhone, but that’s not the point. The point is to provide this sort of targeted usability in a smaller form factor, so that you don’t always have to be whipping out the ever larger smartphone. It’s application-specific stuff built into clothing or accessories you can wear every day.

Interestingly, the companies that make these wearable devices not only have to deal with the technology, but also with the fashion. It’s not good enough to produce a functional smartwatch or fitness band; the thing has to look as good as it works. Clothing isn’t all about functionality, after all. It’s also about fashion and comfort. That’s a challenge to tech companies such as Apple and Microsoft, but one their designers are no doubt aware of.

Certainly, there is sufficient incentive for these companies (and lots of new startups) to get it right. Experts predict wearable technology will become a $70 billion business over the next decade, so there’s lots of money to go around. The biggest segment of this business will center around health-related devices, such as fitness trackers, medical devices, and the like. But smartwatches also represent a big opportunity, as do completely new types of devices, such as Google Glass and other heads-up displays.

It’s obvious that the smartwatch, like all wearable tech, is an emerging product. Only 2 million smartwatches were sold in 2013, although Business Insider forecasts that by 2018 more than 90 million of the things will be sold each year. If that prediction comes true, and figuring an average selling price of around $200 (which may be low), that translates into an $18 billion market, which ain’t small potatoes. (And explains why Apple wants a piece of the pie.)

What exactly is a smartwatch? It all depends—a smartwatch can be different things to different people. Some smartwatches are nothing more than watches with built-in digital music players. Others connect (wirelessly) to your smartphone to send and receive calls and texts, as well as access other phone-based apps. Other smartwatches do fitness tracking, monitoring heart rate and physical activity. Still others record digital photos and videos. And some smartwatches, in the future, might function like full-fledged computers.

Of course, one of the most important features of a smartwatch is telling time—it is still a watch, after all. To that end, most smartwatches offer customizable displays that can look like a standard watch face, a digital watch, or a mini-computer screen. You personalize the screen however you like.

Today’s smartwatches are tethered to another device you carry on your person, most often your smartphone, typically via Bluetooth technology. Tomorrow’s smartwatches may be freestanding devices, with enough built-in computing power to render the connection to a smartphone unnecessary.

The Gear 2 also functions as a standalone music player, with enough onboard storage for a medium-sized digital music collection. It also includes a built-in infrared (IR) blaster, so your watch can work as a remote control for your living room TV.

Oh, and it tells time, too. All for just $299.

Like most competing smartwatches, the Apple Watch runs a variety of popular apps (many while tethered to your nearby iPhone). You’ll be able to send and receive text messages (via iMessage), Twitter and Facebook updates, and email. You also have access to Weather, Calendar, and Photos apps. The Passbook app includes the new Apple Pay wireless payment system. And there’s Apple Maps to keep you on track—as well as that works.

Naturally, the Apple Watch will play back all the music in your iTunes collection. It also functions as a bit of a fitness tracker with built-in health sensors and fitness and nutrition apps.

Pricing starts at around $350 and goes up from there, depending on the style, color, and band you choose. That puts the Apple Watch smack dab at the top of the market, price-wise—even if the feature set is more grounded in the middle of the pack. Apple being Apple, of course, the Apple Watch will no doubt appeal to a ready-made base of fanboys and followers, with no compunction about lining up days in advance to pay whatever Apple demands for the latest shiny shiny.

More advanced fitness trackers are designed specifically for runners and other serious exercisers. These devices, typically in the form of a specialized smartwatch, use global position system (GPS) and other technology to record and monitor your distance, time, pace, heart rate, and other vital statistics.

Whatever type of tracker you’re looking at, expect to find a variety of form factors. Some are designed to look like smartwatches; others are integrated into armbands or wristbands; still others clip on your belt or can be worn as bracelets or necklaces. Choose the one that best suits your lifestyle needs.

• Casio OmniSync STB1000

• Fitbit Flex, One, and Zip

• Garmin Forerunner and Vivofit

• iHealth AM3

• Jawbone UP24

• Microsoft Band

• Misfit Shine

• Polar FT2, FT4, FT7, FT40, FT60, FT80, and Loop

• Samsung Gear Fit

• Withings Pulse O2

For example, the Garmin Vivofit, shown in Figure 6.4, tracks how many steps you’ve taken and how far you’ve travelled. It also calculates calories expended and monitors your heart rate. Even more fun, it keeps track of time and lets you know when you’ve been inactive for too long. Nice nagging, there. It costs $129.

Where the Vivofit is in the familiar band form factor, the Fitbit Zip is a less obtrusive clip-on device, as you can see in Figure 6.5. You can attach it to your belt or other piece of clothing, and it tracks steps, distance, and calories burned. It synchs to your smartphone or computer, from which you can track your progress. It’s also less expensive than the Vivofit, at just $59.95, and comes in a variety of stylish colors.

Then there’s the newest and most notable entry into this collection, the Microsoft Band, shown in Figure 6.6. As the name implies, the Band is in a typical wristband configuration that displays key fitness-related data—how far you’ve run or walked, your heart rate, and so forth. It also includes built-in GPS tracking, so it knows where exactly you’ve been.

One cool thing about the Microsoft Band it that it ties into your smartphone (iPhone, Android, or Windows Phone) and the new Microsoft Health app that helps you track and manage your health-related activities. It also displays email messages, calendar alerts, and the like, as piped from your phone. The Band runs $199, which is a tad higher than many competing devices.

For example, if you want to monitor your blood pressure, you can use a wireless blood pressure monitor such as the iHealth BP7 or Qardio Qardiarm. Use the Lumo Lift to monitor your posture, or the colorful SunFriend (shown in Figure 6.7) to monitor your exposure to ultraviolent (UV) light. And the HealthID Band functions as a high-tech emergency medical ID bracelet.

Then there’s AiQ’s BioMan t-shirt. This funky piece of clothing has “smart sleeves” that monitor the user’s heart rate, perspiration rate, and skin temperature. That’s pretty cool in and of itself, but the shirt can also be modified to measure skin moisture, electroencephalography (EEG), and electrocardiogram (EKG) signals. It sends its results to your smartphone or computer via Bluetooth.

In addition, OMsignal sells what the company calls “biometric smartware.” We’re talking sports-oriented t-shirts that, in addition to their other features (including moisture wicking fabric with strategic compression), come with little black boxes that record and stream real-time biometric data to your smartphone. As you can see in Figure 6.8, the shirt is cool looking and futuristic, and it’s a great way to track all your physical performance.

And that’s just what’s available today. How about a simple patch that attaches to a home-bound patient’s arm that then sends all manner of vital statistics to his or her clinic or doctor across town for remote diagnosis? Or a similar wearable that monitors a person’s activities and alerts his health insurance company of what he’s doing right or wrong—so the insurance company can raise his rates for bad behavior? Or contact lenses for diabetics that test the wearer’s tears for glucose levels? (That latter one is actually under development by Google, believe it or not.) It’s all coming. Just wait for it.

Most of these devices are small enough to slide into a coat or shirt pocket. They all work in a similar fashion and include the Spy Spot TT8850 Micro Tracker, Trackimo GPS Tracker, and PocketFinder Personal GPS Locator.

When it comes to keeping track of younger children, consider the Lok8U (“locate you”—get it?) Freedom for Kids, which straps on like a wrist watch and lets you track their location from a mobile receiver. As you can see in Figure 6.9, the Trax tracker is even smaller; just slip it into your kid’s pocket and then track his location from the associated smartphone app. (It also works for keeping track of your pets.) You then track the device’s location using the matching smartphone app.

And if what you really want is an instant alert in case of an emergency, there’s the V.ALRT Personal Emergency Alert Device. It’s a round button-like thing, not much bigger than a quarter, that you or members of your family can carry in a pocket or around your neck. One press of the button and the V.ALRT pings your smartphone and sends personalized emergency texts to three preselected contacts. The text says that help is needed and includes location information from your phone’s GPS sensor.

Then there’s Cuff, which offers a line of smart jewelry (bracelets and necklaces) that function as location trackers and emergency transmitters. Press a button on the Cuff and an alert (including your current location, via GPS) is sent to a list of designated recipients. Cuffs are more stylish than typical location trackers, so that’s different.

There are two different types of wearable cameras. The first, what we’ll call action cams, are ruggedized for use in capturing sporting activities, such as biking, skiing, or parachuting. These include the venerable GoPro (shown in Figure 6.10), Contour+2 and ContourRoam2, Garmin VIRB Elite, and Sony POV Action Cam. You can mount these cameras on a helmet or body harness, or just hold them in your hand.

The next category of wearable camera we’ll call the spy cam. These cameras are small enough to be either unobtrusive or totally unnoticeable. Most will fit in your pocket or clip on your clothing and let you record your surroundings without anyone else noticing. These wearable cameras include the Narrative Clip (which clips onto your shirt, as shown in Figure 6.11) and Autographer (designed to wear around your neck), both perfect for constant filming of what some are calling “lifelogging.”

You’ve probably read about Google Glass, and how it’s revolutionizing all sorts of things. Google calls it nifty futuristic wearable “smart eyewear,” and I suppose it is—although it’s really a lot more. (Including a wearable camera.)

You can use Google Glass to make phone calls, send messages, listen to music, track your fitness routine, map your location (and provide driving or biking directions), search the Web, and—oh yes—take pictures and videos of everything you see. You can also use Google Glass to make phone calls and listen to music, so you don’t need to whip out your smartphone quite as often. All this makes Google Glass the ultimate wearable tech today, although it’s bound to be surpassed in the future.

Not unexpectedly, Google Glass is a little on the pricey side—$1,500 to be precise. That’s the price of being on the bleeding edge.

First, there’s the concern that someone wearing Google Glass is taken out of the moment. Who’s to say that the sweet young thing sitting across the table from you on a potentially romantic date isn’t surreptitiously surfing the Web or playing solitaire via her stylish Google Glass eyewear? You know how tempting it is today to whip your smartphone to check messages or do a Google search; imagine the world if you can do all of this with a blink of the eye while pretending to pay attention to the person you’re talking to. The potential for increased inattentiveness is frightening.

Then there’s the privacy issue. Since you can use Google Glass and similar devices to record audio, video, and still photos of whatever it is you’re looking at, who’s to know that the person you’re talking to isn’t recording the entire conversation? Or using the opportunity to spy on the surrounding location? Or taking creepy unwanted photographs of pretty women? Or even making an unauthorized recording in a movie theater or playhouse?

For all of these reasons, and probably a few more, not everyone is looking forward to a Google Glass-enabled future. When you think about it, Glass and its ilk represent an unsettling (and unsettled) technology. It opens up new privacy and new social issues. These issues probably don’t warrant legislating against the technology, although there will no doubt be some effort to do just that. It makes you wonder, though—just what rights do you give up when you start wearing a somewhat stealthy universal recording device? And how involved can you be in the real world when there’s a constant gateway to the Internet literally staring you in the eye?

It’s not surprising, then, to see that a lot of fans and early adapters are ditching Google Glass. Initial users (dubbed Glass “Explorers”) have scaled back their day-to-day use, many selling their units on eBay for a fraction of the initial price. While developers continue to explore industry-specific apps for the hardware, development of consumer apps has dwindled to next to nothing. Several key employees in Google’s Glass division have left the company (including the lead developer), and Google has quietly pushed back its planned 2014 official release of the product. It’s looking less and less likely that Google Glass has a prominent place in our wearable technology future. The combination of high geek factor, low usefulness, and high price is deadly to mass adoption of any technology, and that’s exactly what Google Glass is experiencing. Even Astro Teller (yes that’s his name—changed from Eric), head of the Google X research labs, thinks that Glass is wildly overpriced, and that convincing people to wear smart devices on their faces is, in his words, a “tough sell.” He thinks the price needs to be a quarter of the current price, tops, to garner consumer interest.

I think he’s right. Google Glass at $350 would be a lot more interesting than the same product at $1,500. But even then, convincing large numbers of consumers to adopt such an intrusive piece of technology as part of their clothing isn’t an easy sell. As Teller says, “It’s going to be a bumpy ride.”

For example, the Razer Nabu, shown in Figure 6.14, is a wearable “smartband” designed for social media use. It delivers messages and logs your activity data, as might be expected, but also lets you interact with other Nabu wearers in your vicinity. It’s supposed to learn from what you do to offer you more personalized options.

Then there’s Ring, from startup Logbar Inc., a “wearable input device” that looks like... well, a ring. This deceptive little gizmo, shown in Figure 6.15, lets you control selected home appliances and apps with a simple gesture. You can also use Ring to send messages by drawing letters in the air with your finger. And, like the best of wearable tech, no one will know you’re wearing anything special.

If you have a drawer full of mismatched socks, wearable technology provides a solution in the form of Smarter Socks by the BlackSocks company. These are socks with built-in radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips. Use the associated Sock Sorter app to keep matching pairs together. (The app also keeps track of how many times your socks have been washed, in case you’re interested.)

If the idea of smart socks isn’t crazy enough, check out Smart Diapers from Pixie Scientific, shown in Figure 6.16. (Yes, Smart Diapers.) This wearable-for-the-infant set contains embedded sensors and a unique Quick Response (QR) code. Scan the QR code with your smartphone and the associated app analyzes the data collected, alerting you to signs of urinary tract infections, kidney problems, and the like.

Hail the new frontier—of digital diapers!

When you consider the wearable technology of today and the foreseeable future, you note that few of these devices are self-contained. The data collected by a given device might display on that device, but most often is transferred (wirelessly, of course) to a smartphone, tablet, or computer for further analysis. An activity tracker collects and transmits data about your daily activities; smart clothing collects and transmits data about your skin temperature, heart rate, and the like; and Google Glass records and transmits images and sounds from the world around you.

In any case, your wearable tech interfaces with and shares collected data with your smartphone or computer. That’s where it ends, right?

Wrong. The data that your wearable technology collects doesn’t always stop at your smartphone or computer. In many cases, your personal data is beamed back to the company or service that manufactured or sponsors your wearable technology item. And this is an issue.

Given that much of this data is biometric data about your body, it can be used by healthcare professionals to determine proper care and medication. Or it can be used by insurance companies to set your insurance rates—or even deny coverage, based on what you’re doing or how healthy (or unhealthy) you are.

This raises several issues, the first (but certainly not the most important) being who profits from this data. Spoiler alert: It’s not you.

When Apple or Samsung or Google or whichever entity receives data about you collected by one of its devices, it can sell that data to any number of companies. The operative word here is “sell,” of course. Selling customer data is set to become a significant revenue stream for companies participating in the wearable technology market. The more data a given device collects, the more opportunities a company has to profit from that data.

You, however, don’t—profit, that is. Whatever data Apple and Google collect and sell, they keep all the money generated by that data. They don’t share it with you or any other customers. You have become, in effect, a tidy little revenue generator for those big companies, and you don’t get paid for it. Doesn’t sound cricket, does it?

That’s a reasonable response, especially when you consider how guarded physicians and hospitals are with medical records and personal data today. It’s the law, actually; healthcare professionals and institutions have to keep your medical records private. You have to give your permission for any additional use, even if it’s just transferring those records from one clinic to another.

The law in question is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), and it’s designed to protect patient data and medical records. It’s a good law, if sometimes cumbersome for your doctor’s office to deal with. Unfortunately, the HIPAA doesn’t apply to user-generated data collected by personal wearable devices or clothing. So any data Apple, Google, and their ilk collect can be used (and sold) however they deem fit.

Unless, that is, you say they can’t. Some manufacturers let you configure their devices (actually, the apps that manage those devices) to determine who can access that data and how it can be used. Some don’t. And there’s always the potential for privacy breeches that might expose your data, either from the device itself or with the company collecting the data. There’s no clear privacy path on this as yet.

In fact, it’s a safe bet that none of these companies are collecting this data with the goodwill of mankind in mind. They’re in this business to make money, and they will figure out a way to generate a profit from the data their devices gather.

To that end, HealthKit acts as a central storage and distribution point for all manner of health-related data collected by the Apple Watch and similar devices. Already, Apple has partnered with the Mayo Clinic and Epic System (a leading electronic health records company) to manage this data and somehow make it available to physicians and other healthcare professionals.

Apple isn’t the only company thinking along these lines. Google has its similar Google Fit, a health hub for user data collected from wearable Android devices. And Samsung is developing a cloud-based software platform dubbed SAMI, for analyzing and managing data collected from its wearable devices.

So there will be competing services playing in the wearable data management space. Apple, Google, and Samsung are all courting application developers with their proprietary software development kits (SDKs) for their respective services. All are courting other technology companies to tie their devices into their respective systems. All are courting healthcare data management companies to get into the healthcare end of the system. With all this activity, it’s a cinch that your personal data will end up somewhere else other than your wrist or computer desktop.

There is certainly the promise that this collected data can be of tremendous value to individual users. That’s especially so when the data from multiple sources can be combined and analyzed, so that intelligent decisions can be based on that data.

Consider, for example, if your smartwatch detects a variation in your heart rate and, simultaneously, your smart shirt indicates that you’re sweating and having trouble breathing. Separately, that might mean nothing. But combine the data points and a smart service might rightly determine that you’re about ready to have a heart attack and then alert paramedics or your doctor of your situation.

These devices can detect more than just emergencies, of course. If your fitness tracker is monitoring your vitals on a daily basis and then sending that data to your physician, your doctor will know immediately when you need to change the dosage of your blood pressure, thyroid, or diabetes medicine. No waiting for the next doctor’s appointment and the dreaded blood draw; the data flows regularly.

Even better, the large amount of data gathered can be used by experts to gain deeper insights into various medical ailments. Consider how much more we could learn about diabetes or high blood pressure with the kind of mass real-time data collected from a cross-section of the wearable tech public. Thinking in these terms, wearable technology represents a real boon for medical research.

Other uses of this data are potentially less noble, however. Think advertising here. If you start to gain a little weight or otherwise get out of shape, that data might be sold to a fitness center who then sends you targeted messages inviting you to try out their facilities. Or maybe you’ll start receiving online ads for diet health drinks and personal trainers. Stuff like that.

Insurance companies are in business to make money. That’s a given. The days of “sharing the risk” are long gone; they want to make a profit on every customer they have, and if they can’t, they don’t want that person as a customer. It’s business, that’s all it is.

One way to make money off a given customer is to charge that customer a rate commensurate with his likely use of the company’s services. Put more succinctly, if you’re healthier, they charge you lower premiums than if you’re less healthy. Older individuals get charged more (because they’re more likely to get sick); younger individuals get charged less. Up until the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA, known on the street as Obamacare), insurance companies could even deny coverage if you had a preexisting condition; they can’t lose money on you if they don’t insure you at all.

This costing by risk factor is one reason why your health insurance rates fluctuate from year to year. What if, instead, your insurance company monitored your health on a daily basis and adjusted your rates just as often? If your blood pressure starts to go up, your rates do, too. (Which could cause a corresponding increase in your blood pressure when you find out about it—it’s a vicious cycle.)

This is why the big insurance companies—United Health, Kaiser Foundation Group, Humana Group, Aetna, and the like—have been all over the manufacturers of wearable technology to get a seat at the table. It’s not that they want to partner with the tech companies; they just want access to the data they collect. As wearable tech becomes more mainstream, that’s more insured people that the insurance companies can gain more information about—and then use that information to either adjust rates or even deny coverage.

And it’s not just the insurance companies. Many large employers are overly eager to gain access to this sort of data about their employees, in order to lower their health insurance costs. Imagine one of those emotionless desk jockeys in your company’s human resources (HR) department, hunched over a computer dashboard monitoring the real-time biometric data of the company’s employee base, determining which employees should be rewarded for their good health and which should be docked or terminated for being too fat or too lazy or eating an extra brownie for lunch. Scary but more than possible. It’s the way these people work.

In fact, they’re already laying the foundation for this Orwellian HR nightmare. Check out the number of fitness tracking devices from Fitbit and other companies that are being sold directly to large corporations. Then delve into your company’s latest corporate wellness program and notice that fitness tracking bands are now being offered, at a special employee discount price. Then consider why your company wants you to wear a fitness band, and how it might use the data collected from it.

There are many real-world examples of this already. Take oil company BP, which gave 14,000 employees free Fitbit Zips in exchange for letting the company track their steps over a one-year period. If an employee walked more than one million steps, he or she gained wellness points that could go toward lower insurance premiums.

Now, that’s positive reinforcement and that’s well and good as far as it goes. But it’s still using personal data to try and change individual behavior, and some feel that oversteps the bounds. What’s to stop a company from using a stick instead of the carrot, as BP did? Imagine your employer taking away wellness points if employees don’t meet certain activity targets. (Know that many employers already add surcharges to employees’ insurance premiums if they smoke.)

It comes down to this: How much do you want your employer or your health insurance company to know about you? And how far do you trust them with the information they have?

First, make sure you read, understand, and agree to the privacy and data sharing policies for each wearable device you own. If you don’t like the way a given company shares the information gathered by its smartwatches or fitness trackers, choose a model from a company that’s more conscious of your privacy.

Second, make sure you configure each device—and its accompanying apps and services—to share as little data as possible with the mother ship and associated third parties. While not all data sharing can be avoided, especially if you want to maintain full functionality of the device, turn off as much of it as you can.

Finally, if you’re really concerned about your medical data being overly shared, avoid this sort of wearable technology. I know, I know, there’s benefit to be had from wearing the latest smart shirt or activity band, but if you don’t wear the darned thing, it can’t collect any data about you. Given the importance and sensitivity of much of this information, it’s a tradeoff you have to consider.

• AiQ Smart Clothing, Inc. (BodyMan shirt), www.aiqsmartclothing.com

• Android Wear (smartwatches), www.android.com/wear/

• Apple (Apple Watch), www.apple.com/watch/

• Autographer (wearable camera), www.autographer.com

• BlackSocks (Smarter Socks), www.blacksocks.com

• Casio (OmniSync STB1000 fitness watch), www.casio-usa.com

• Contour (Contour+2, ContourRoam2 wearable cameras), www.contour.com

• COOKOO (connected watch), www.cookoowatch.com

• Cuff (smart jewelry), www.cuff.io

• Fitbit (Flex, One, Zip activity trackers), www.fitbit.com

• Garmin (Forerunner, Vivofit, VIRB Elite), www.garmin.com

• Google (Google Glass), www.google.com/glass/

• GoPro (action cameras), www.gopro.com

• HealthID (Health ID Band), www.healthid.com

• iHealth (AM3, BP7 monitors), www.ihealthlabs.com

• Jawbone (UP24 activity tracker), www.jawbone.com

• LG (G Watch), www.lg.com/gwatch/

• Logbar, Inc. (Ring controller), www.logbar.jp/ring/

• Lok8U (Freedom for Kids tracker), www.lok8u.com

• LumoBodyTech (Lumo Lift), www.lumobodytech.com

• Martian Watches (Voice Command and Notifier smartwatches), www.marianwatches.com

• Microsoft (Microsoft Band), www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/

• Misfit (Shine monitor), www.misfitwearables.com

• Motorola (Moto 360 smartwatch), moto360.motorola.com

• Narrative (Narrative Clip camera), www.getnarrative.com

• OMsignal (biometric smartwear), www.omsignal.com

• Pebble (Pebble Smartwatch), www.getpebble.com

• Pixie Scientific (Smart Diapers), www.pixiescientific.com

• PocketFinder (Personal GPS Locator), www.pocketfinder.com

• Polar (FT2, FT4, FT7, FT40, FT60, FT80, Loop), www.polar.com

• Qualcomm (Toq smartwatch), toq.qualcomm.com

• Qardio (Qariarm monitor), www.getqardio.com

• Razer (Razer Nabu smartband), www.razerzone.com

• Recon Instruments (Recon Jet, Snow2 heads-up displays), www.reconinstruments.com

• Samsung (Galaxy Gear 2, Galaxy Gear Live, Gear Fit), www.samsung.com

• Sony (Smart Watch SW2, POV Action Cam), www.sony.com

• Spy Spot (TT8850 Micro Tracker), www.spy-spot.com

• SunFriend (UV monitor), www.sunfriend.com

• Trackimo (GPS Tracker), www.trackimo.com

• Trax (Trax tracker), www.traxfamily.com

• VSN Mobil (V.ALRT Personal Emergency Alert Device), www.vsnmobil.com/wearables/v-alrt/

• Withings (Pulse O2 activity tracker), www.withings.com