Ahead of Apple Watch Debut, Jawbone and Others Push Fitness Wearables to Businesses

With Apple's Watch looming on the horizon, fitness makers are moving to push their services to a variety of individual and corporate customers. The latest band maker to improve its offerings is Jawbone, which this week announced a new program designed to get its UP fitness bands into the office and on the wrists of business people in the US.



The new UP for Groups provides discounts on bulk orders of the fitness trackers, as well as software features to manage and encourage group participation. It is compatible with the existing UP24 tracker, the new UP Move and the upcoming UP3.





Unlike the individualized consumer version of UP, UP for Groups allows administrators to work with large groups of participants. Admins can view aggregated statistics to see when their employees need to move and send out timely activity reminders to the group. Participants can take part in group challenges and view their group's statistics with an emphasis on the number of active participants in a group and not the number of steps walked by each member.



The new UP for Groups is part of a growing movement to address obesity in adults using feedback from fitness trackers. Jawbone competitor Fitbit already has a corporate fitness program, while Misfit is partnering with the Oscar insurance company on a rewards program for subscribers with healthy habits.



Apple's upcoming Watch is expected to kick off a further explosion of interest in fitness trackers when it is released in 2015. Increased consumer interest will open new doors in the health field with Apple reportedly in talks with insurance companies, hospitals and other health institutions about its HealthKit initiative and iOS Health app. Apple already is partnering with the Mayo Clinic and electronic health record company Epic Systems, and more partnerships are undoubtedly in the works.

Read More [...]

Posted in 2014 at 04:53PM, December 11

Apple to Unveil New iPads, Retina iMacs, and OS X Yosemite on October 16

Apple is planning to hold its next fall event on Thursday, October 16, where it is expected to introduce new iPads, reports Re/code . The company is also expected to introduce new Retina iMacs and release OS X Yosemite to the public.



According to Re/code, Apple's iPad event will be more low-key than its September iPhone event, and it will be held at the company's Town Hall Auditorium. The company's iPhone event, which saw the introduction of the iPhone 6, 6 Plus, Apple Watch, and Apple Pay, was held at the Flint Center, where the original Mac was unveiled 30 years ago.




Physical mockup of the second-generation iPad Air

Apple has a few more new products to unveil before the year is out, and it plans to show them off in a couple weeks. Sources tell Code/red the company will hold its next special event on Thursday, Oct. 16 -- not the 21st. Headlining the gathering: The latest updates to its iPad line, along with those new iMacs that 9to5Mac told us about earlier this week. Also: OS X Yosemite.

Apple's next-generation iPad Air and iPad Retina mini are both expected to come with updated processors and support for Touch ID, the fingerprint first sensor introduced with the iPhone 5s. The iPad Air may also come in a gold color variation, and it may include a new anti-reflective laminated display.



The Retina iMac, which may come with a "5K" resolution of 5120 x 2880, may be available only in 27-inches and it may also feature AMD graphics. It is expected to use a Haswell processor, as next-generation Broadwell processors for the iMac won't be available until 2015.

Read More [...]

Posted in 2014 at 04:53PM, October 03

Sprint brings down the hammer with $60 unlimited plan… but there are some catches

Sprint's not going down without a fight. The carrier on Thursday announced a new plan for individual subscribers that would give them unlimited talk, text and data for just $60 per month, the lowest price of any unlimited data plan offered by a major wireless carrier in the United States. However, there are a couple of catches with this deal you should probably know about.

Continue reading...

Read More [...]

Posted in 2014 at 04:53PM, August 21

Apple Now Replacing Damaged iPhone 5s Displays in Retail Stores [iOS Blog]

Apple will soon be able to offer display repairs on the iPhone 5s directly within its retail stores, alleviating the need to send the devices to an off-site repair center. As noted by 9to5Mac , Apple Stores are currently accepting large deliveries of iPhone 5s screens for the repair program and in-store repairs are set to begin on Monday, August 4.



The in-store repairs are part of an effort to lower repair costs. Apple first began offering in-store phone repairs for the iPhone 5 back in June of 2013, and expanded to iPhone 5c repairs in January of this year.



Users with a cracked or damaged iPhone 5s display that do not have AppleCare+ now have the option to pay a $149 fee to get the screen repaired right at an Apple retail location. Prior to establishing an in-store repair center, users were forced to pay $229 for a replacement screen as Apple had to send damaged devices off-site.



With the ability to replace iPhone 5, 5c, and 5s screens, Apple can significantly cut down on repair costs and wait times. In a June 2013 employee meeting, Apple noted that its in-house repair policies could save the company as much as $1 billion per year.

Read More [...]

Posted in 2014 at 04:53PM, July 31

Alleged iPhone 6 Rear Shell Shown From Multiple Angles in New Photos

Back in late May, a single photo of an alleged rear shell from the iPhone 6 surfaced, showing what appeared to be a thin metal part with cutouts on the rear for not only the camera, microphone, and flash, but also the iconic Apple logo.



A new photo set shared by Nowhereelse.fr [Google Translate] now shows a similar part from various angles, with its apparent high quality bolstering speculation that this may indeed be a genuine iPhone 6 shell.




Interior (left) and exterior (right) of alleged iPhone 6 rear shell


Side views of the shell show the now familiar cutouts expected for the iPhone 6, including the standard mute switch and elongated volume buttons along the left side. The right side features a SIM tray toward the middle and what has been reported to be a relocated power button, with Apple perhaps moving the button from the top edge to the side to make it more accessible on the larger device.




Left and right sides of alleged iPhone 6 rear shell


The report mentions that the cutout for the Apple logo points to the possibility of a lighted logo that could be used for notifications, but we believe this to be unlikely. Shell cutouts for the Apple logo are not uncommon for iOS devices, although they have not been seen on the iPhone before. But for iPad models, Apple has traditionally preferred to use a shell cutout with an embedded Apple logo rather than printing the Apple logo on the shell, in some cases such as in the original iPad placing antennas in the region to help overcome the shielding effects of the metal casing.



For the iPad mini, the Apple logo was printed on the first-generation models, but for the current generation the company has shifted to an embedded logo. As a result, we expect an embedded iPhone 6 logo to similarly be for aesthetic or perhaps antenna reasons rather than for illuminating the logo itself.



The iPhone 6 is expected to debut around the September timeframe, perhaps initially with the rumored 4.7-inch model while an even larger 5.5-inch model arrives up to several months later. Apple should also be releasing iOS 8 to the public at around the same time based on past patterns, and Apple's iWatch is tentatively targeted for an October unveiling.

Read More [...]

Posted in 2014 at 04:53PM, June 08

Beats Acquisition Boosting Apple's 'Coolness' Factor Among Young Consumers

Last week, Apple confirmed its plans to acquire Beats Electronics and Beats Music in a $3 billion deal that would bring a successful headphone business and a fledgling streaming music service under Apple's umbrella. While many have pointed to Jimmy Iovine as the acquisition target, Apple may also be using the deal to boost its "coolness" factor among younger users, as suggested in a survey by education technology company Chegg (via Re/code).



Chegg asked 10,000 students about their experience with Beats and their knowledge of the Apple-Beats merger. While most of the students surveyed were familiar with the Beats brand, only 15 percent had purchased Beats products and a mere three percent had subscribed to the Beats Music service. More than half of the students (60 percent) were aware of the deal with one quarter claiming the deal will make Apple more "cool" and fifty percent believing the acquisition will increase Apple's popularity among students.

This is largely good, albeit unsurprising, news for Apple, which has long dominated the college market. In most college lecture halls across the country, you’ll see rows and rows of MacBooks — many of which were purchased using Apple’s educational discount or in Apple-affiliated campus stores. Still, more and more young people are streaming music using services other than iTunes. Spotify has more than 40 million subscribers, and 40 percent of its American users are between the ages of 18-24.

Beats is often criticized as being a bass-heavy fashion accessory and not a true audiophile product, but sales figures reveal that the typically younger consumers who buy Beats are more interested in appearance than audio quality. According to marketing research company NPD, Beats accounts for 27 percent of the $1.8 billion headphone market and more than half (57 percent) of the premium market for headphones with a starting price tag of $100 or more.

Read More [...]

Posted in 2014 at 04:53PM, June 03