Arguably the biggest mobile-device breakthrough at this year's South by Southwest Interactive confab in Austin will be a unique bracelet, made by one of several Toronto-based wearable start-ups at the show, that could soon make even cutting-edge technologies like fingerprint sensors a thing of the past.
The Nymi device from Bionym contains a security advancement that, if widely adopted, could make passwords, security keys and all other methods of digital identification obsolete.
Straight out of the future, the wristband turns the wearer's own heartbeat into a secure biometric identifier that can be used to access a home, car, office, computer, mobile device — anything that requires an authenticated ID.
The company's sensor technology is just one of many mobile computing advances that soon will help create customized real-world experiences for consumers – or at least for those who don't mind giving up a large degree of their digital privacy.
These experiences will not only be personal but also predictive — offering us help before we have to ask for it — thanks to the wealth of data these wearable devices now collect on their owners.
Or, as Bionym says in a research paper describing its product: "Our devices will start to know us better than the people who are closest to us... They will know what we want before we do because they are tracking our activity patterns, and they are always looking out to see what environmental conditions could put us off schedule."
While that may make privacy advocates cringe, Bionym's product — like those coming from other Toronto startups such as Kiwi Wearables Technology and PUSH — offer consumers the chance to use detailed data about their own activities to improve their lives.
Kiwi Wearables' forthcoming! wristband, called the Move, uses an array of sensors to capture and analyze data on even the most subtle gestures.
The result can be a better golf swing or throwing motion for athletes, or tighter collaboration among musicians.
The PUSH Strength, meanwhile, is an armband that helps produce more of what its name implies. Its sensor technology measures the force of human muscle movements, providing feedback to boost the effectiveness of weightlifting and other strength conditioning.
The companies are part of a cluster of wearable-computing start-ups centered around the Creative Destruction Lab, a tech incubator at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management. http://www.creativedestructionlab.com/
This simmering cauldron of wireless engineering creativity is stirred up by events such as Wearable Wednesdays -- a regular Toronto meetup -- and ambitious-sounding efforts such as the Ontario Cross-Border Technology Innovation Ecosystem and the MaRS Discovery District in that city. http://www.marsdd.com/
The wireless technologies that will enable a wide array of new consumer applications are already in use today, and well beyond Canada.
From the motion-capture software in video-gaming devices like the Wii and Kinect to the customer-aware sensors at the entrance to most retail stories to the short-range Bluetooth chips now built into most high-end smartphones, the future is here now.
For example, let's say you walk into a meeting or a party with a co-worker or friend and suddenly spy someone or something that you know they would wish to avoid.
Imagine if a tap on your own shoulder or swipe of your sleeve could send them a secret warning without the aid of human speech or any handheld device.
At OCAD University's Social Body Lab, also in Toronto, artists and fashion designers are working alongside engineers and interface designers to create clothing that can conduct this type of advanced communication. http://research.ocadu.ca/socialbody/home
All three Toronto wearable companies are now testing beta versions of their products and plan to ship consumer versions in the next few months.
John Shinal has covered tech and financial markets for 15 years at Bloomberg, BusinessWeek, the San Francisco Chronicle, Dow Jones MarketWatch, Wall Street Journal Digital Network and others. Follow him on Twitter: @johnshinal.
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