Health Tech, SYN

Movano Begins Testing Its Smart Ring for Women With Novant Employees

Wearables company Movano Health recently partnered with Novant Health to beta test its smart ring — which is designed for women — with the health system’s employees. The program is expected to prepare Movano for its first direct-to-consumer product launch in the first half of next year.

On Tuesday, wearables company Movano Health partnered with Novant Health to beta test its smart ring with the North Carolina-based health system’s staff.

Movano is a Pleasanton, California-based company that was founded in 2018 and went public last year with a $48.9 million IPO. Its first commercial product is a smart ring designed specifically for women.

“It’s designed to be comfortable, accurate and intelligent,” said Movano CEO John Mastrototaro. “The ring measures heart rate, blood oxygen levels, sleep, respiration rate, temperature, activity and more. It delivers value by going beyond a dashboard of graphs and numbers, providing real tools that empower women to take ownership over their health journey.”

For the beta program, about 30 Novant employees will wear the ring to evaluate its functionality and wearability. The program will be “an extremely valuable exercise” for Movano because it will enable the company to collect data from a broader group of people, Mastrototaro said. Movano will use the data it collects to fine tune its algorithms and assess how well its ring meets user expectations. 

During the beta test, the ring will track Novant employees’ steps, heart rate, blood oxygen levels and sleep stages. Movano will collect feedback weekly from each participant. At the end of the program, the company will gather users’ customer satisfaction scores, which will be used to determine areas and features that require improvement, Mastrototaro said.

The partnership will prepare Movano for its direct-to-consumer product launch in the first half of 2023, he explained.

The beta program is also an important step on Movano’s journey to FDA clearance. The company is prioritizing medical-grade accuracy so that consumers can trust that their health data is being used to provide meaningful insights, Mastrototaro said.

“The ring’s development as a medical device rather than a wellness wearable ensures it will provide an advanced level of accuracy that consumers and medical professionals can trust,” he explained. “While a few wearables obtain medical clearance on individual algorithms for metrics like ECG and AFib, Movano Health’s ring is designed per regulatory standards and built in a medical device manufacturing facility that meets ISO13485 and cGMP standards.”

Movano’s smart ring further differentiates itself from other wearable health devices, such as Oura’s smart ring, because it is designed with only women in mind. Most wearables have been designed for men and sized down for women “as an afterthought,” Mastrototaro pointed out. 

Instead, Movano carefully considered “the nuances of the female body” and the women’s unique health concerns, he said. In Mastrototaro’s view, the ring combines medical-grade capabilities with the “trend-forward look of contemporary jewelry.”

Movano’s partnership with Novant isn’t the only beta test it launched for its smart ring this year. In August, the company began a beta program for the ring with Stanford University’s Applied Sports Science Department.

Photo: Drazen Zigic, Getty Images

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