Wearable: Trend and TWS (true wireless stereo)

Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro is announced, featuring “Intelligent ANC”, head tracking for 360º sound “Dolby Head Tracking”, an 11mm woofer and 6.5mm tweeter for better audio quality. The earbuds house 3 microphones and a Voice Pickup Unit (VPU) that can ascertain — using both hardware and software. It is priced at USD199. (GSM Arena, Samsung, The Verge, Neowin)

TWS (true wireless stereo) hearables and smartwatches continued to shore up the wearables market in 2020, with annual TWS shipments expected to grow 83% to 238M units, while smartwatches will weather subdued category spending to increase 2% to tip the 100M mark. The wearables market is divided into 5 distinct segments, of which earwear and wristwear comprise the majority of devices. Combined, they accounted for 93% of the overall market in 3Q20, with earwear growing fastest on product changes from vendors and shifts in consumer demand. (Counterpoint Research, GSM Arena)

A study by New York’s Mount Sinai hospital shows how Apple Watches could spot a coronavirus infection before a diagnosis. The researchers have used data from Apple Watches to track a metric called heart rate variability (HRV), which measures how much the time between a person’s heartbeats changes throughout the day. High HRV means that the person’s nervous system is responding to cues in a healthy and active way, while a low HRV implies that the nervous system could be struggling to adapt to changes. Scientists know that low HRV can predict if a person may be infected by a virus, so the researchers wanted to check whether it could be used to predict coronavirus infections in particular. (Digital Trends, CBS News, medRxiv, Apple Insider)