Samsung is striving to beat Apple to launch non-invasive blood glucose monitoring technology, as well as continuous blood pressure tracking features, Bloomberg reports.
The efforts are part of the company's wider push to offer more health capabilities, embodied by the recent announcement of the Galaxy Ring, which touts activity and sleep tracking, with more health features set to arrive later. In a new interview, Samsung's mobile digital health chief Hon Pak said:
If we can do continuous blood pressure and glucose, we're in a whole different ballgame. I think that's where everyone is trying to get to. We're putting significant investment toward that.
[...]
We are looking at everything from miniaturization to the various different technology platforms that can do some type of glucose monitoring or anything in between.
Pak declined to comment on a time frame for launching either of the features in specific Samsung devices, but believes that non-invasive glucose monitoring technology could come to market in some form within five years. Current blood glucose monitoring systems usually requires pricking the skin, but Apple has reportedly been working on a unique non-invasive approach for over a decade. The company is believed to have made major progress with the technology, increasing pressure on rivals to provide competing features.
While Samsung smartwatches already offer the ability to determine a user's blood pressure, the capability is not constant and requires specific calibration with a separate blood pressure monitor. Apple is purportedly planning to add hypertension detection to the Apple Watch later this year with no calibration requirement, but it will not provide exact readings, instead simply informing users that they may have elevated blood pressure.
Like Apple, Samsung is also reportedly exploring adding health sensors to future versions of its earbuds, such as body temperature and heart rate monitoring, since the ear is a closer pathway to the heart than the wrist. Health information from the ear could be combined with data already collected from the wrist for even greater accuracy.
