New sports watch for athletes employs Nordic’s Bluetooth IC to transmit training data to smartphone or other devices.
Ultra low-power (ULP) RF specialist Nordic Semiconductor has announced that the world’s first strapless continuous heart rate monitor for athletes, the MIO ALPHA sports watch, employs a Nordic µBlue nRF8001 Bluetooth low-energy Connectivity IC (‘Integrated circuit’ or ‘chip’) to communicate live or stored training data directly from the wrist to any Bluetooth v4.0 enabled smartphone or device.
The class-leading ultra-low power and RF performance characteristics of the Nordic Semiconductor µBlue™ nRF8001 Bluetooth low energy Connectivity chip enable the MIO ALPHA’s built-in rechargeable lithium ion battery to offer up to 10 hours of ‘live’ heart-rate smartphone-linked monitoring (its most energy intensive operating mode). This ensures reliable performance even in demanding 2.4GHz operating environments such as busy, modern gyms that can house numerous local active devices and emitters (in particular Wi-Fi) all working on the same frequency.
In operation, the MIO ALPHA can be used as a standalone device and includes features such as workout timers, continuous heart rate display and audible heart-rate zone alerts, or in conjunction with popular smartphone apps such as MapMyRun, RunKeeper and Wahoo Fitness, says the company.
