Apple may be designing and developing its own "health hardware products," according to a job listing spotted by MyHealthyApple.
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Apple is hiring a Senior Engineering Project Manager to join Apple's Health Hardware group, which is part of Apple's Health Technologies division. The listing explicitly states that Apple is developing its own health hardware products, which appear to be separate from the Apple Watch. Unlike the Beddit sleep tracker, which was acquired by Apple in 2017, these "health hardware products" would come directly under the Apple brand.
The Health Hardware group is looking for an Engineering Project Manager (EPM) to lead the design and development of Apple-branded Health Hardware products.
Health Technologies is an interdisciplinary team of engineers and creators at Apple who are involved in a wide range of initiatives, products, and services, such as Apple Fitness+ and partnerships with Biogen and ZimmerBiomet.
The role sits among several other EPM hires on the Jobs at Apple website. The Health Hardware EPM manager is expected to oversee the product build itself as well as be responsible for interfacing with suppliers and even marketing.
EPMs are fearless organizers who are ready to work with the highly skilled Hardware, Software, Mechanical Design and Industrial Design teams to identify and resolve potential risks to the schedule and quality of the product. The EPM will interact with these engineering design disciplines plus Safety, Reliability, Marketing, Packaging, Manufacturing, Component Engineering, and other resources inside and outside Apple.
The EPM is also the key interface to the suppliers, driving build readiness at the factory and managing the build itself. Success is defined in terms of the quality and timeliness of the pre-production builds and the start of mass production.
The listing's emphasis on hardware product development and "driving build readiness at the factory" may suggest that Apple-branded health hardware products are already fairly developed, and could even be set to enter factory production soon.
Apple is increasingly interested in health and fitness innovations. Most Apple health features have been channeled through the Apple Watch and iPhone so far, but with HealthKit and the health infrastructure it has established, it would make sense for Apple to offer a broader range of health hardware products.
The new health hardware product job description does not provide any indications about the nature of these new products, but other HealthKit-compatible products on the market currently include weighing scales, blood-pressure monitors, thermometers, and more.
Top Rated Comments
I love my Smart Body Monitor, BPM Core, Sleep, and Thermo. Very Apple-like design, slick integration of all data into one app. Apple would have a long way to go to get me to replace any of them. I do aggregate data into Health but it's always been pretty erratic, far more than the native apps it draws from.
As far as data security, it's only ever going to be as secure as the weakest link. Hardware is one thing, what about all the fitness and diet apps that link to the fitness tracking apps to track macros and calories etc? Unless Apple can replace Strava and Garmin Connect and food apps like MyFitnessPal and Carb Manager the user will always have to choose between sharing data somewhere or lose core functionality. Especially as many of them are social media platforms in themselves that some have invested in for decades. A bit akin to Apple TV+ taking on Netflix. Can complement but not close to replacing at this point!
I currently have a smart scale, and I would rather it be Apple's than Lenovo's, since the only way I can get the readings into Health app is if I first use Lenovo's app to bring the data on the scale into my iPhone. Now, who's to say Lenovo is not swiping my health data out to interested parties? I'd rather spend (reasonably) more and get an Apple scale and have peace of mind.
That said, they should not have exited the markets they did - display, AirPort, etc. I would like to see them coming back to those products as well.