Apple has officially bought sleep-tracking company Beddit, signaling Apple's desire to evolve its Health-focused efforts beyond tracking steps and fitness levels into analyzing sleep behavior and patterns.
Apple Acquires Beddit
Beddit, for the uninitiated, makes sleep tracking hardware and software. On Monday, May 8, it updated its policy to inform users that their data will now be "collected, used, and disclosed" in compliance with Apple's own Privacy Policy, now that the Cupertino, California-based tech company has purchased the Finland-based company.
"You can use Apple HealthKit to connect the Health app to the Beddit mobile app. Connecting the Health and Beddit apps is optional, and you control what data flows between the apps," the updated privacy policy adds.
How much Apple bought Beddit for remains undisclosed and Apple is, as usual, laconic about the exact terms of the acquisition. But it appears Beddit's apps for Apple Watch have been taken down. What Apple intends to do with Beddit is unclear, but the best guess at present is that the purchase is bound for the company's biomedical engineering unit.
Founded in 2007, Beddit launched its products in Apple Stores late 2015. Carrying third-party products in its own brick-and-mortar stores is a way for Apple to know which ones click, and to whom. Beddit 3 is the sleep-tracking company's latest product, a slim sensor strip that's laid on a bed to analyze its owner's heart rate, respiration, sleep time and efficiency, movement, snoring, and much more. The device, still up for sale on Apple's online store, costs around $150.
What Is Apple Going To Use Beddit For?
Apple-branded mattresses are not going to happen anytime soon, so let's get that out of the way. Rather with its recent purchase, Apple is further cementing its seriousness in the health-tracking business. For a number of years, Apple has been working on sleep-tracking for its smartwatches, notes Bloomberg. With its sleep-tracking knowhow, Beddit could expedite that process and, in turn, help Apple herald its smartwatch line as full-fledged health tracking devices, a notion Tim Cook seemingly supports already.
Apple could announce more health-tracking features soon, add to that its much taller ambitions of turning the HealthKit platform into a full-on diagnosis tool. Partnered with Apple's Night Shift feature on the latest versions of iOS, which adds a red filter to help people get better sleep, Beddit can help Apple take sleep features to the next level, possibly by providing iPhone owners with sleeping activity, data, the whole nine yards.
Beddit says its customers can use HealthKit to connect the app to Apple's own Health app. The purchase button on its site now reroutes customers to Apple's online store, and its product is no longer listed on Amazon. What's more, Beddit was previously working on an app for Android, but that detail is no longer on its site.
Thoughts on Beddit? Do you think Apple should expand its biomedical engineering efforts to include tracking users' sleep activity? Feel free to sound off in the comments section below!
