The rapid development of technologies is creating innovative solutions and influencing all sectors, making many daily activities easier and more effective.
Fitness is one of them.
We are experiencing, in fact, the development of many realities and technological tools related to fitness: from apps for athletes to video games that allow exercise, from wearable and motion-sensitive devices to workout in virtual reality.
The consumers of these new digital products benefit enormously. They are people who work out, go to the gym, like to monitor their progress and check their fitness goals.
But that’s not all: the gyms themselves, by implementing more cutting-edge management software and digital products for their users, more advanced and technological fitness equipment, can benefit from this new and interesting union between fitness and technology.
The worldwide success of this trend has allowed new important investments every year for the development and expansion of services and products, within this new sector that sees fitness and technology in cooperation.
But what are fitness technologies exactly?
There are endless examples, starting from simple devices like Fitbits which help control our weight, diet, exercises, calories consumed during training and many other factors. A fitbit is very small and can be put onto clothes or worn on the wrist; it also sends the information to our personal account on the Fitbit website via wi-fi.
There are also many apps that exploit the combination of fitness and technology. Fitocracy, for example, is an app that consists in a real video game where users collect points every time they record improvements by performing the planned exercises.
When it comes to fitness video games, as well as for game consoles, we’re spoilt for choice and this shows how extremely precise technologies, combined with the ability to entertain and engage users, can motivate training.
Moreover, there are cases in which technologies and benefits of virtual reality are applied to the world of fitness, such as Keiron itself, that offers gyms the first virtual reality workout where users play, have fun, and at the same time perform a high-intensity interactive and effective training.
How much are these innovations worth?
Cb Insights estimated the value of the fitness tech startups by 2017 to $2.4 billion in funding. In 2017 alone, these startups generated investments for $585 million.
These investments were mainly made by US companies (64%), but also Asian and European ones, followed by Indian (with 7% of deals), Canadian (5%), British and Chinese (both with 3%), and German companies (2%).
Europe has a weight of 15% of total deals in the fitness sector: in addition to Germany and England, Sweden and the Netherlands are also very active in this sector. As for Italy, there are no relevant data.
In Italy?
In spite of this, there are several innovations related to fitness tech in Italy, where a good example is Technogym, a world-leader company in technologies and services for fitness and wellness.
Technogymis constantly active in the research and development of alternative solutions that combine training and health with technology, always with a special focus on the user.
In 1996, the Italian company was the first one to launch a software for managing training in the gym, this being the first of a long series of innovations including the first TV screen integrated into fitness equipment, the first training product connected to the network, the first cloud platform for connecting people and clubs in the fitness world. This latest, innovative innovation, featured in the platform MyWellness, allows everyone to play sports while using their favorite apps, set their fitness goals and carry out their training program even when they don’t have time to go to the gym.
There’s no doubt that this interesting new combination of fitness and technology is bringing about significant changes. There are high expectations, as are the standards to aim at. What can we expect in the future?