Today we’re “speaking” with Brett Canfield, CFO at REFLX Labs, which makes Bionic Foot Sensors – Boogio.
Brett has 20 years of experience in launching startups, managing brands and technology changes, and creating distribution and supply chain systems. At REI, Wizards of the Coast, Hasbro, and Amazon.com, he has implemented large-scale branding, supply chain, and process implementations. Brett is also a successful entrepreneur and has built two businesses to over $2M in annual revenue.
Here’s what he had to say about Boogio and the overall mHealth industry…
How would you pitch your company? What’s your elevator pitch?
Our company is bringing to market the most advanced Bluetooth enabled wearable technology ever created. The Boogio Developer Kit is pair of Bionic Foot Sensors and a software development kit (SDK). “One Giant Leap for Wearable Technology” aptly states how advanced the capabilities of the Boogio hardware are compared to anything else available to customers today. We think Boogio IS the future of wearable technology.
What sets your product apart from competitors?
There are four things I want to emphasize here:
- Boogio fits inside any shoe. This is a huge benefit because unlike wrist or eye wearables, it is integrated and unobtrusive. Boogio means not having to “remember” to put one more thing on my body every day. Other wearable manufacturers keep trying to get us to add new things to our body. Boogio is integrated in something we are already going to wear every day.
- Boogio is NOT part of a shoe or part of a shoe insole. It is an ADD ON to any pair of shoes. Boogio means that customers who wear orthopedic insoles and purchase specific types or brands of shoes are able to use it, as well.
- Boogio is the Swiss Army Knife type of wearable technology in that it can accomplish many tasks and it is not confined to one task, such as “counting steps”. Boogio generates data showing G Force, center of balance, pressure on front/middle/rear of the foot and 3 dimensional acceleration and deceleration of the feet. This data signal is beamed to a smartphone, and the user can then analyze the information recorded. Alternately, this data can be used to control other Bluetooth-enabled peripherals or to control a gaming avatar.
Side Note: NO other wearable device generates G Force data – this is a major feature of Boogio and a required feature in order to understand how G Force impacts the way our bodies move. - Boogio is currently available as a Developer Kit. We include the basic software to get someone started in getting it set up to handle the data for game play, sports and fitness and a controller for other Bluetooth LE peripherals.
What’s your business model?
We’ll make money from selling developer kits and retail product. The former are set to ship in May 2015, while the latter are expected to hit shelves for the Holiday 2015 season.
Can you share some numbers? How many users do you have?
No numbers to share at the moment. We currently have working prototypes and will begin shipping our product next year.
Where do you see the company going from here?
We will be 2% of wearable device market in 2018.
Where do you see the mHealth industry going?
The tipping point is 2-6 years away depending on whether a nation is pro adoption of change in health care vs. struggling with internal vested interests that are able to systemically resist positive changes towards mHealth.
How long are we from seeing modern mHealth technologies going mainstream?
It is happening currently for unregulated devices such as step counters as businesses reward employees for counting their movement and giving them a deduction in health care expenses. For regulated devices, this depends on a country by country basis with Australia and Canada leading in the developed world because they have incentivized mHealth adoption through legislation.