CES 2013: Lots of Health and Fitness; Where’s the Market?
Shelly Palmer
I’ve been looking at a lot of people’s wrists lately. Not because I have some weird fetish or anything. I’m curious about whether wearable devices like the Nike+ FuelBand and Jawbone Up are really taking off. While that remains to be seen (I’ve only spotted about a dozen in the wild), it hasn’t stopped device manufactures and app developers from getting into the fitness-tech game. Case in point: More than 220 companies will showcase their health-and-fitness products at International CES next week — a 30 percent increase over last year’s show, according to Consumer Electronic Association CEO Gary Shapiro. Companies include Fitbit, Polar, and BodyMedia, which plans to introduce a waterproof patch. An Ohio startup called HealthSpot will be at CES showing off its HealthSpot station. Described as an “ATM for healthcare,” users will be able to walk into one of theses kiosks at a pharmacy or grocery store, input their symptoms and chat with a board-certified doctor via video conferencing for further advice.
