The fashion design house has only just recently launched its first wearables and is now jumping in faster.
Despite the fact that Misfit remains a startup that has been around for only four years, its successes in wearable technology have caught considerable attention from the industry, to the point that it is now being bought out by the fashion giant, Fossil Group.
Among Misfit’s most popular wearables have been the Shine, Shine 2, link, Flash Link and EKOCYCLE Field Band.
Misfit’s wearable technology has been focused in the highly successful fitness category. It was founded by veterans of the industry such as Sonny Vu, AgaMatrix’s Sridhar Iyengar, a well as the former CEO of both Pepsi and Apple, John Sculley. It has managed to carve such a significant name for itself in this already competitive industry that Fossil Group has been watching it and has now decided to buy it.
The purchase of Misfit will set Fossil up to make some much more sizeable steps into wearable technology.
Recently, Fossil launched the Q Founder based on Android Wear, which was its first ever smartwatch. That said, a partnership with Misfit will make it possible for future wearables from the designer to be able to offer a broader spectrum of different features that consumers may find to be appealing and useful.
Misfit has been a wearables innovator, making it possible for it to help Fossil to place itself into a more important position within the wearable tech industry as a whole. This is particularly important as Chinese devices makers are now aligning themselves to start to release alternatives to the current options, which will likely appear at a lower price point. Large companies and watchmakers such as Fossil, that are hoping to make and hold an important position in the industry will need to ensure that their products are both stylish and that they will stand apart from the rest of the offerings.
Misfit will bring a number of wearable technology advantages to Fossil, including a spectrum of products, its own devices, its hardware and software engineering team, and a scalable cloud and app platform.
Some in the industry are saying that the designer brand may bring legitimacy to the wearables market.
Fossil has recently unveiled a line of new wearable technology in the form of smartwatches, making the designer brand one of the most recent entries into this ecosystem among companies that had not previously been tech-focused.
As of yet, other big names in the same category have not managed to see any large scale successes with wearables.
Companies such as Adidas, Nike and Under Armour have all stepped into wearable technology in various forms, despite the fact that tech has not previously been a central component of their offerings. As of yet, major success has not been seen by any of those brands. In fact, while Under Armour has placed a delay on it device, Nike has altogether abandoned its own. Fossil’s hope is that its name will bring some legitimacy to this brand of the market and that consumers will see the draw of these devices in fashion as much as function.
So far, the wearable technology market has proven to be a very challenging one to all companies involved.
Even the wearable tech that has been launched by companies that are giants in the technology industry has not been flying off the shelves. In the smartwatch from Fossil, the hope is that the partnership between that brand and IBM will show that the design of the device can be made appealing enough for consumers to want to wear it while the features will be attractive enough to offer more than just a novelty.
Aside from what consumers actually choose to do, the entry of Fossil into this space, particularly in partnership with IBM, could help to underscore the relevance of these devices within the overall technology environment.
Fossil is currently the leading fashion watch manufacturer worldwide. That company manufactures watches for several of the top designer brands in addition to the wristwatches that they create under their own name. By bringing that name into wearable technology, it may be another much needed shot in the arm for the industry in the eyes of both the companies involved and for consumers.
Recently, Fossil launched the Q Founder based on Android Wear, which was its first ever smartwatch. That said, a partnership with Misfit will make it possible for future wearables from the designer to be able to offer a broader spectrum of different features that consumers may find to be appealing and useful.