Not wanting to get left behind by the likes of Under Armour, Nike and Adidas, New Balance announced today (Jan. 6) that it was launching a tech division to develop fitness gadgets for all levels of athletes and enthusiasts.
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New Balance’s new division will be called New Balance Digital Sport and it will attempt to better understand, motivate and improve performance of athletes via digital experiences and new wearable technologies. There will be three different product categories for the Digital Sport unit.
Although the company did not announce any particular product, New Balance said the first device to be released will be an Android Wear running watch with built-in Global Positioning System and Google and Intel technology. It alludes to the inclusion of a Global Positioning System chip so you could work out and track your route without a phone, and it explains that you’ll be able to load your music and listen directly from the watch (which you can already do on any Wear device).
New Balance Digital Sport will develop a comprehensive athlete-focused digital ecosystem featuring innovative New Balance-branded wearable technology products created to improve physical performance. The watch will be ready for the 2016 holiday season.
“Digital technology has truly revolutionized, very quickly, this industry and New Balance wants to continue to be a brand on the forefront, arming our athletes with the cutting-edge products that will help them reach peak performance”, said Rob DeMartini, President and CEO of New Balance.
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The final part of New Balance Digital Sport is the beginning of their own run club which will launch in Boulder, Colorado early this year. That is pretty much it, we’ll see what comes out of this partnership, and New Balance’s Android Wear-powered smartwatch sure sounds exciting, even though we don’t know much about it at the moment. New Balance is the only major company to make or assemble more than 4 million pairs of athletic footwear per year in the U.S., which represents a limited portion of our United States sales.
