Consumer adoption of smart wearables is now nearly half (48%) of U.S. Internet households, Kristen Hanich, director of research for Parks Associates, told a Connected Health Summit audience Thursday, signaling that the category is “crossing the chasm” -- or moving from early adopters to the mainstream.
Five years ago, “adoption was half of what it is today,” she noted, adding that as the category has evolved, consumers are increasingly turning to service subscriptions on top of the cost of the wearables themselves.
One third of wearable owners now have such subscriptions, Hanich said. These are led by cellular plans, but “fitness and lifestyle subscriptions, premium health insights, and health coaching services are in demand and growing,” she explained.
The wearables market is led by smart watches, “owned and used by roughly a third of U.S. internet households,” Hanich reported, followed by smart scales, and then connected exercise equipment.
Moving up, though, are smart rings and hybrid watches (which look like dumb analog watches despite being smart). Indeed, she said that 12% of households are likely to purchase a smart ring in the next six months, a figure just about equal to those looking to purchase both hybrid watches and GPS sports watches. Smart watches and fitness trackers still lead in consumer want lists, however.
Hanich pointed out that smart rings and hybrid watches have the advantage of being screenless devices.
From the article, "Ring This Up: Smart Wearables Hitting Mainstream Status" by Les Luchter
More than half of SMBs are concerned about cybersecurity regarding employees’ home networks, while 21 percent report an increase in need for products and services to protect or monitor the physical sa...
Among the featured presenters on Tuesday was Elizabeth Parks, president of Dallas-based research firm Parks Associates. Her presentation, titled “Value of Monitoring: Expanding Beyond the Traditional...
Compared to just a few years ago, home networks today have never been so full of connected devices. Parks Associates research from 2020 found that U.S. broadband households now have an average of 12 c...
And without further ado, the following list selected by SIA’s Women in Security Forum, in partnership with SSN, will be profiled in each issue of SSN in 2022: Arathi Ajay, IoT Sales Specialist - Ed...
