Amazon announced the Halo and Halo Band today, a new health and wellness brand and product that combines “a suite of AI-powered health tools with an innovative and stylish wrist band.”
Amazon’s new Halo brand includes several interesting features that utilize artificial intelligence, or AI. These include computer vision technology to give an accurate body fat percentage, the tone feature designed to provide a complete view of health by understanding how people sound to others, plus activity and sleep tracking functionality.
For hardware, the Amazon Halo Band is designed to be distraction-free. The unit does not include a screen or the ability to handle notifications, but instead simply consists of a cluster of sensors and a band – customers can pick from three fabric bands as standard with optional fabric and silicone accessory bands also available in fifteen colors. The unit sensors include an accelerometer, temperature, heart rate, and two two microphones. There’s a button to toggle the microphones plus an LED indicator. The Halo Band is water resistant and the battery is reputed to last up to a week, although takes an hour and a half to recharge.
Although the hardware seems comprehensive, Amazon Halo’s software sounds well thought out. The software sets a goal of 150 activity points a week, and are accrued depending on the intensity and duration of movement. Walking will accrue points, but running will accrue more, and staying too still in the day will reduce activity points. The software interprets data from the accelerometer, heart rate, and temperature sensors to measure sleep quality, providing wearers with a score out of one hundred. Machine learning and computer vision is used to measure body fat temperature, which Amazon reckon is twice as accurate as at-home smart scales.
The device uses its microphones and machine learning to assess the tone of voice, and by doing so, to help the wearer understand how he or she sounds. Amazon Halo’s notes explain that the software, “…may reveal that a difficult work call leads to less positivity in communication with a customer’s family, an indication of the impact of stress on emotional well-being.”
In addition to these core features and benefits, Amazon Halo will also come with access to the Halo Labs feature, which consists of a range of scientifically-proven workouts, experiments, and challenges to help customers improve their health. The example given is that customers might determine that reducing caffeine intake in the afternoon may improve the quality of sleep, but the press release does not mention how this could adversely affect the tone of their voice! Amazon Halo have created their own Labs programs and also worked with well-known brands such as Aaptiv, the American Heart Association, Harvard Health Publishing, Headspace, Orangetheory Fitness, Russell Wilson, and others. Amazon Halo are planning on adding additional modules from more providers.
On the subject of privacy, Amazon Halo is keen to explain that the new product has, “…multiple layers of privacy and security [are] built into the service to keep data safe and in customers’ control.” The service encrypts data, which may be downloaded or deleted by the customer at any time. Tone voice samples are processed on the customer’s smartphone and are not audible anywhere else. There are granular controls to allow the Amazon Halo service to link with other providers, and mentions WW (formerly Weight Watchers) as there not only being a connection between the two services, but WW is offering a promotional deal providing customers with a free Halo Band plus six months of membership upon signing up for a new membership. Other providers include the John Hancock Vitality wellness program, Cerner (for an easy way to share health information).
The Halo Band is launching with three available colors: a Black fabric band and Onyx unit, Blush fabric and Rose Gold module, or Winter fabric band with Silver capsule. Optional fabric bands will have an early access price of $19.99 and will come in Denim, Hummingbird, Mint Edge, Olive, Unicorn, and Volcano colors. The sport accessory silicone bands have an early access price of $15.99 and the nine available colors are Ash, Black, Dark Mint, Domino, Lavender, Pink Slate, Seafoam, Sunset, and White.
The Amazon Halo software is compatible with both Android and iOS smartphones, and from today American customers can obtain early access to Amazon Halo starting today for $64.99, which includes the Amazon Halo band and six months of Halo membership – check out the Amazon microsite here. The normal price will be $99.99 and Halo membership will cost $3.99 a month. You can still use the Amazon Halo service without a paid subscription but only the basic information will be available.
Source: Amazon
