Wearable maker becomes a wearable software provider (industry shift?)

A wearable device company has shifted to being a platform for all wearables.

Movable, which made its bones selling to schools and corporate wellness, announced today it’s opening up its software platform so other wearables can plug in to its dashboard and back-end analytics.

The numbers tell the tale of how competitive the health wearables device space is. Movable’s fitness band product was competing with scores of other wearables. Blake Squires, Movable’s CEO, thinks the company’s software is better than that of its device competitors, though.

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So now organizations using any device – including Garmin, Jawbone and Fitbit – can buy Movable’s platform to manage wellness programs and track fitness goals, among other things.

The Movable software platform works this way: it has a front-end system that wearable users can operate, coupled with an “Admin Center” that can be used by a manager to communicate with and set goals for everyone involved in, for example, a health challenge.

As Squires puts it, wearables are not one size fits all in terms of practical use. So having the option to use the company’s platform on multiple devices is a benefit. Also with the growing market, it allows many people who already have various devices to still have the option to sync up.

“We see the future as using our activity and program data to better inform interventions – whether simple wellness or complex disease management,” Squires stated in the company’s press release, which went out today.