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HTC burned another $101 million in the last three months
Much as we'd like to sugarcoat it, the unfortunate truth is that HTC is in trouble, and the situation is only getting worse. The phone maker has posted a third consecutive loss-making quarter, eating around $101 million (£69.6 million) in the last three months. A side-by-side comparison of the same period last year is even more doom-laden, since when it was generating a profit, it was only squeaking a meager $5.6 million. Last year, we asked if HTC was going to be the first really big Android manufacturer to slide into the sea. On this evidence, there's very little that's going to change our mind.
For Under Armour, health tracking is more than a wristband
Under Armour's pitch got me excited. Rather than dropping another fitness tracker on the world, the company had a vision. An ecosystem more robust than the competition and geared toward athletes, not just people looking for a pedometer. Sure, there's a wearable, the UA Band, but that's just one small part of the equation. There's also a WiFi scale, a heart-rate monitor, headphones and even connected shoes. Plus a raft of apps like Endomondo, MyFitnessPal and the hub for it all, Under Armour Record. It's a world of apps, gadgets and services that are supposed to work together to make a slimmer, faster and more motivated me. A little more than a month into immersing myself in that world, I've found that the truth doesn't quite match those lofty ambitions.
HTC and Under Armour's HealthBox hits the UK in June
Arguably the biggest unveiling at CES this year, at least for fitness fanatics, was the UA HealthBox by HTC and Under Armour. There's just one problem for Brits: all three gadgets won't be available until June, well after their US launch date of January 22nd. So if you're ready to buy an activity tracker, scale and heart rate monitor right now -- the basics for a "get fitter" New Year's resolution -- you might want to look at other options.
Under Armour and HTC built an entire fitness ecosystem
Under Armour is a king in the realm of sport apparel. But it's been laying the ground work for sometime now to become a bonafide technology company. It started some years ago with the E39 and eventually the company moved on to the Armour39, but both had fairly limited use cases. In late 2013 though, it started stockpiling fitness apps. For 2016 its bringing all the pieces together, including a partnership with HTC which is helping to design its hardware. But this isn't just another wearable, Under Armour is going all in and launching an entire ecosystem of apps and gadgets at once.
