As the wearables market continues to rise in prominence, one of the industry’s leading players has slammed the mass of poorly designed devices clogging the market.
According to Misfit CEO Sonny Vu, the wearables space is filled with ‘not very well designed’ products and a flurry of wearables that have been ‘designed by geeks, for geeks’.
Having risen to prominence over the last 18 months with the launch of the simple – and stylish – Misfit Shine and more affordable Misfit Flash, the company has prioritised good looks over superfluous features – something many of its rivals have failed to do.
“I think our bet on design and fashion has paid off,” Vu said speaking exclusively with TrustedReviews recently.
He added: “A lot of the stuff that is out there is not very well designed and is not very interesting from a fashion perspective so there was a hole in the market, especially for women.
“A lot of the products out there, they look like they were designed by geeks, for geeks. Honestly there aren’t that many geeks.
“If you look at the nearly 8 billion people in the world, there are a lot more women than geeks.”
While the wearables market has grown to account for everything from smartwatches to fitness trackers – and everything in-between – features such as heart rate monitors, touchscreen displays and integrated cameras have been crowbared in at the cost of designs pleasing to the fashion conscious.
Although companies such as Misfit, Apple – with the Apple Watch – and Withings – with the stunning Withings Activité – are now leading the wearables space down a more design-led route, Vu has predicted the fleet of ugly wearables won’t disappear anytime soon.
“I’m not too surprised that we are still seeing so many geek for geek wearable designs,” he told us. “That’s just how people think. It’s a hot space and it’s still very early in this space.”
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Outlining Misfit’s philosophy for approaching the wearables market, he added: “Design really was the focus at the start.
“We wanted to get a few things to work really well such as a long, long battery life, waterproof, wearable anywhere and then just great design that you wouldn’t feel silly wearing.
“I wanted to make something that my mum would wear.”