Most wearable market data says that there's still plenty of headroom in the health & fitness market with 81% of consumers citing purchasing interest, but a recent study revealed the wearables’ next great market opportunity lies in devices that help track the whereabouts of family members and protect their safety. Skyhook is excited to usher in those safety features by partnering with hereO - a kid safety, location-enabled smartwatch.
hereO has developed the smallest cellular-connected GPS location device in the world. The device allows families to check current or historic locations of their loved ones as well as give directions to find one another. The trendy watch is designed for children aged 3+ and is comfortable, water resistant and can withhold up to 60 hours of usage between charges. The watch also has a built-in panic feature that sends an alert to the parent when triggered.
Since over 80% of consumers say location accuracy is important to them when considering a wearable, we asked Jonathan Meister, VP of Strategic Partnerships at hereO to talk about what makes the hereO watch a top family choice.
1. How would you describe hereO’s role in the wearables space?
With over 50B connected devices by 2020 (as forecasted by Cisco), including your coffee machine (automatic capsule refill anyone?), your toothbrush (no more hiding from your dentist), your car (à la Knight Rider) and everything in between, IoT is driving a new world of hyper-relevant information delivery.
And at the core of this connectivity mesh will of course be us, the users, and by extension our loved ones. Enter hereO, a start-up with a razor sharp focus on serving the evolving needs of the everyday, all-day connected family. Founded in 2012, hereO is the creator of the world's first end-to-end connected family ecosystem driven by a range of state of the art location sharing technologies including a GPS watch for kids and stand-alone mobile app for teenagers and parents.
2. What product features do you think parents will be most excited about?
Our location sharing devices incorporate all of the bells and whistles one might (and should!) expect from such products including pinpoint global positioning, real-time location updates, safe-zone notifications, panic alerts, two-way messaging and more. Contrary to the half-baked alternative solutions currently available on the market, hereO has spent the past four years developing a unique, reliable and consistent location-sharing device designed from the ground up specifically for kids ages three and up. Put in simple terms, the hereO GPS Watch is 30%-50% smaller than the next competitor in line, has a battery life that last 3-5 times longer and most importantly, it works!
3. What drove hereO to team up with Skyhook?
The first prototype device we developed had GPS-only functionality. While great for locating devices outdoors, indoor coverage was dismal at best. We had no intention of releasing a product that would fail to deliver the type of experience our customers expected, so it was back to the drawing board for us.
Fast forward to today, and our state of the art GPS has been complimented with advanced Wi-Fi hardware and triangulation algorithms, enabling location updates that can be as accurate as 1-2 meters, both outdoors and indoors. Our founding team has worked closely with Skyhook in the past on other ventures and has been intimately familiar with the company’s location solutions for some time. With Skyhook’s highly competitive offerings, domain expertise and professional team, the decision to partner with them was an absolute no brainer.
4. How does our location technology give you a competitive edge?
Skyhook is a leading player in the location positioning industry overall and wearable-optimized location solutions in particular. Its ever growing 1st party location network perfectly complements our proprietary location tracking services and commitment to deliver a "best of breed," solution for family location enabled wearables.
5. Where can we expect to see hereO go next?
As a company established by parents, for parents, our goal from day one has been to fundamentally improve and transform the way families connect. Despite the obvious hair-pulling challenges familiar to anyone who has endeavored to innovate, hereO is continuously hard at work building on and expanding its family-centric ecosystem. In addition to our GPS Watch for Kids and stand-alone smartphone 
app, our development pipeline includes an exciting range of products including a soon-to-be-launched Pet Tracker, Tracker of Things, and GPS Watch for Seniors. The result is an ecosystem that covers the family's every need with a comprehensive, holistic and personalized approach all under one brand, service and app.
6. Where can I get a hereO watch?
The hereO GPS Watch for kids can be purchased online or via our partner retail partners. The first store to carry hereO products will be Harrods of London (as of the end of November) and we will be rolling out in-store availability to other countries in early 2017. Stay tuned!
Want to learn more about powering wearable device location? Download our eBook on how location data is fueling the wearable revolution, and where the wearable industry is headed by clicking the button below.
