One of the biggest competitors to the popular fitness tracking market leader Fitbit (which has a 70% share) is the Burlingame, California company Misfit, founded by Sonny Vu, who is also its current CEO. But it’s understandably difficult to compete with someone that already has such a big piece of the pie, so you have to be creative in order to try and wrest some consumers to your side.
Fortunately, you can put on your “Go underdog!” hats, because Vu seems to do a pretty good job of being creative and sticking with the fight. One of the moves he recently took was to start putting a lot more focus on sales in China. And he’s managed well, since currently a third of Misfit’s sales go there.
That probably has something to do with the fact that Misfit’s version of a fitness tracking bracelet, called Shine, is very amenable to fashion, with its sleek, metal design. Especially since competitors’ versions are usually plastic, bulkier etc. And especially since in China, visual aspect seems to be one of the higher priorities of buyers.
But that’s not the only thing Vu is doing to ramp up his sales and its not, by far, the most interesting. That honor would go to his decision to make the second version of his product, Shine 2, into more than just a fitness tracker.
Namely, Shine 2 has all the functionalities that Shine had (track certain metrics, such as calories and steps, as well as the quality of your sleep), but on top of that it is also a first step by the company in making a controller for your interactions with the objects in your environment.
You can do things with it like change the song in Spotify, turn on or off lights which it has access, simple operations like this. The way it manages to accomplish them is by using Misfit’s Link smartphone app, with which the new fitness tracker and controller Shine 2 is integrated. If the external object or service you wish to manipulate also has an interface with Misfit’s app, you’re good to go.
And the company intends to increase the number of such integrations, like for example, making it possible for you to call a car via Uber or Lyft using Shine 2, a feature they hope will be available starting in 2016.
To help such interactions and make them more powerful, the Shine 2 also has a far longer Bluetooth range than its predecessor (30 feet compared to a few feet), which was achieved by ingeniously using its metal body as an antenna.
So, all in all, it looks like Misfit is on its way to some serious and interesting innovations. Let’s hope they manage to deliver.
Image source: 1.
Deborah Campbell
