Why did Samsung introduce a smart ring, according to the head of the Ministry of Health

Medicine moves to home. Samsung recognizes this and wants to take advantage of this opportunity to be one of the first to offer a comprehensive solution that ensures user comfort during its measurement. And this is where the Galaxy Ring, the smart ring introduced last January, is key to its strategy.

“We can create better sensors and devices, but if no one wears them, it’s useless.“, Comments Hong ParkVice President and Global Director of the MX Digital Health team at Samsung, during a keynote he attended Business Insider Spain.

As the manager said, Galaxy Ring will allow users to measure their sleep in a much more convenient way than wearing a watch, because many people took off their smartwatches from the moment they went to bed until they woke up.

“We listened to our consumers and they asked us for more flexible and convenient solution. So we decided to develop a ring to be able to monitor their sleep, which is key to giving them more accurate readings the next day.

I tested the Galaxy Ring prototype for a few minutes and I think it has a future, but Samsung’s ecosystem will be the key to its success.

But this bet is not trivial. He The e-health market has grown since the pandemic and will grow by $426 billion through 2027.according to a report presented a year ago by Mapfre and Accenture.

“We have one of the most diverse IoT (Internet of Things) ecosystems for the home. And given our decades of experience in health and wellness, we believe we are in a unique position,” he says.

Specifically, Samsung Health, the company’s application available on your computers has 64 million monthly users.

But Park admits they still need partners to perfect the task: “We can’t do this alone. To make this happen, we need an ecosystem of partners.”. They currently do not have a specific contract with public or private healthcare institutions, but they are collaborating with centers such as MIT to offer more advanced measurement systems.

The importance of sleep to offer customized solutions

Park emphasizes the importance of sleep for human health, noting that A dream is a reflection of how we feel at the moment..

If, for example, one night you do not sleep a wink, it is because during the day you have done something that is harmful to your health or you may have some disease, so the company can offer solutions or explain the reasons to you. happens the next day when you get up. On the other hand, if you don’t carry any devices with you during your break, this is not possible.

“AI transforms collected data into actionable insights for the user. The ring, in particular, allows wearers to monitor and track individual sleep or obtain additional information using four indices: heart rate, respiratory rate, nocturnal movements and sleep latency“, he comments.

These The last two are additional parameters to what smartwatches currently show.. Additionally, Samsung has introduced a new tool called Survivability assessment, which collects data on each person’s physical and mental fitness every day and gives them a score. “Ultimately we want to promote behavior change, because changing habits is difficult,” he elaborates. “We have to do it gradually, with little nudges and increments, and we have to know when they are ready to accept them. “We can’t inundate users with information all at once.”

This is quite easy to understand in practice: I myself know that I should not eat ultra-processed foods, such as a bun. However, if I have it in my pantry, it’s hard not to be tempted. So if you avoid it during the day, your score will be higher than if you take it. And how will Samsung know? Through an ecosystem of connected devices.

Challenges Facing the Galactic Ring

Launching a new product category in an ecosystem is not easy.

Samsung confirms that one of the greatest challenges facing today is convince users that this data is key to measuring good health. “It’s about choice and giving people the freedom to wear a smartwatch, a ring, or both, but obviously if you wear both devices, the measurements will be more accurate,” Park says.

On the other hand, it is also important to note the “huge” development they have achieved by combining all these measurement sensors in such a small device.