How much would you pay for an implanted watch?
As we are currently making good progress on our implanted watch (There are a few things we have yet to fully flesh out before we move to the next stage, mostly funding) we want to know how much you would be willing to pay for one? Naturally we will be selling them above our own cost price, as that is how we will be able to afford the prototyping phase, as well as fund the next project after this one.
We want to know, how much would you be willing to pay? If everyone just wants cheap and nasty, thats easy enough and the price would be according. But if you would prefer something that is intended to last 10+ years, totally bioproof and reliable, thats another matter.
We want to know, how much would you be willing to pay? If everyone just wants cheap and nasty, thats easy enough and the price would be according. But if you would prefer something that is intended to last 10+ years, totally bioproof and reliable, thats another matter.
Quick rundown, it will be an analog display, rather simple and easy to read, will come with a charging station and inbuilt battery display. It will shine through your skin when a soft button in the center is pressed.
So everyone, have your say:
<50
50-100
100-200
200-300
300+
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Comments
Analog display... Interesting...
For something like that, I'd be comfortable paying four figures, but if it's anything less than 100% precise and reliable, I wouldn't pay a dime for it. This isn't something that should be half-assed, it has to be perfect or it's worthless.
You say that it will display time to the nearest 5 minutes, and have a battery indicator, and will light on a press. What makes this desirable over, say, a Misfit Shine? It also tracks time to the nearest 5 minutes, lights on a tap, and notifies on low battery via the app. It also has the usual slew of fitness crapola and a budding smarthome expansion they're working on.
An implanted watch needs to stand apart from everything currently out there in some way, to make it worthwhile as an addition to a smartwatch, not a replacement for them. Implanted devices by their nature cannot keep up with such a rapidly-evolving industry as wearables or smartphones, and need to be kept to things that will hold their value long-term. I was looking at implanting a Shine for a little while, to free up my wrist for other better gadgets as the industry evolves - but I canned the idea because tracking time to the nearest five minutes isn't useful enough to be a built-in feature. If I'm only concerned with a "best guess" telling of time, looking at the sky is good enough - watches are for when precision is important. An implanted watch should be something that is useful when you're stranded naked in the middle of nowhere, because that's when it will be the only device you have. You won't have a phone to use the app, you won't have a GPS receiver, you'll just have the watch inside your arm. Good wristwatches can be a lifesaver in land navigation, communication, and various practical "real world" skills that become really important in non-ideal circumstances. This should fill that role and do away with any unnecessary tech wizardry that will already be covered by Apple, Google, Motorola, LG, Microsoft, and everyone else who wants a piece of the wearable pie, and that will really only be best used when you're in ideal circumstances such as in a city, with your usual clothing and gadgets available and a support network in case something fails. An implanted watch will be the one device that sticks around when all of that is taken away, and needs to be useful in that exact scenario in order to "earn its keep".
The above is all just my take on it, other people almost certainly have other intentions and ideas for an implanted watch. But this is what I want out of a $1000+ implantable wristwatch, and I have zero interest in a $50-500 implanted Misfit Shine.
It should provide something they don't, otherwise it will be an expensive, unpleasant redundancy that will fall into disuse and become a liability. Right now, smartwatches really suck at being good watches, and people are getting sick and tired of the fitness wearable market. Find a way to use that to your advantage and make a watch that makes no bones about being a superior watch, and implanting it becomes something awesome you can do to always have your kickass, useful-on-a-daily-basis watch with you while everybody else makes the novel toys that you change on a yearly basis and take off when you feel like it.
Size-wise, everything you said above sounds fine with me. Sloped edges would be nice. Bluetooth to set time would be great.
As for what other features I'd like to see, well, an alarm function of some kind would be fantastic. No sound needed. Vibration or electrical stimulation. Really super snazzy would be an hourly ping of some kind... something that would work as a sort of internal haptic-like feedback that would (hopefully) better attune the implantee's natural timesense. Alarm and a toggle for the hourly ping would ideally be controlled via the aforementioned smartphone app. Sure it would eat battery power to run an alarm or hourly ping, but that's why you'd want to be able to disable them via bluetooth.
As features would increase, what I'd pay would increase. I'd go four digits on the price if it's feature rich and reliable.
Now of course you would be messing with larger leds to shine through the skin, a battery that can hold such a charge for said leds, bioproofing the whole thing, and production cost. But seriously, it's not that complicated. Your traces and actual pcb (probably partially flexboard) should be under a mm in hight, smd parts should be only about 2 mm in hight depending on the part. The high bits will probably be that button and the leds. I find the idea of shoving a 4 mm tall device under my skin pretty unappealing, that bulge is going to be quite noticeable in a place like your arm where the skin is rather tight.
If you have this made by an electronics company they usually have a minimum order number to have a first time design built, figure out how much that minimum order will cost, then add a little to make it worth your wile to sell these things, divide that by how many are in the order and BAM, price.
As for features, on this first Gen I would stick to your basics, but I do want a 1 minute interval. 5 minutes is way to long, but seconds are overkill for telling time, it's a watch not a timer. But as it's updated I would like to see more functions added. An alarm would be nice, or a timer, the ability to program the time from your phone is a big bonus. But depending on the features and the size they take up, I would probably opt for a larger battery instead of more features. Don't loose sight of what this is, it's a watch, and sometimes it's best to embrace the kiss motto.
As I mentioned earlier, the current expected time between charges is around 2 weeks, depending on use. If you only check your watch ten times a day it might last a few months, depending on drain.
Its easy to say figure out the minimum order, but we aren't keen on killing people for cost. The stages are a little more complicated. First is the primary design stage, where we work out what our needs are. Then comes the secondary stage, when our partners work out how to fit it all together. Then is the testing phase where the prototype is implanted in the test subject. Eventually the implant is removed to check for anything that might present a problem, changes are made to the design, and repeat, until the design functions as intended, the product gets pumped out, and we sell it on. The reason I was asking about peoples price ranges is that gives us an idea of what quality people are after. I personally want nothing but the best, but if everyone wanted a piece of crap they can pull out and replace every 24 months, thats what the customer wants, right?
Given that minutes simply increase the number of LED's required on an analogue style watch, if we do minutes we will do seconds as well (Because it takes nothing extra), however as we didn't anticipate people wanting specific minutes so strongly, we are taking a step back and considering the digital display again. The bluetooth module, to me at least, is a vital component. Without it, your watch is stuck on the one time forever.
And as to the longevity of it, I want something that's going to last upwards of ten years, not 24 months. People want everything at the cheapest price possible, but that doesn't mean you have to provide some cheap piece of junk. It is true, $150 is lowballing it, but when you ask someone what they want to pay for an item they'll give you the price they WANT to pay, not what they will pay. Most people on here are saying what they WILL pay, I was just different and said what I wanted to pay.
A quick readthrough of the MSDS for sapphire makes it seem pretty biocompatible, but have any tests been done regarding fouling where sapphire is concerned? A quick search turned up many mentions of porosity in synthetic white (transparent) sapphire. Maybe it's a non-issue, but I'd be interested in seeing some fouling analysis on sapphire. Maybe SfM has looked at sapphire in this regard? @glims? @Cassox?
Also, I'm wondering about the seams the design will have. Even if you've got a single piece of titanium with no seams, there has to be a seam for the window. Seams introduce places where bacteria and detritus could collect. How will this be addressed?