Monthly Archives: March 2017

Technology is pervasive in the fitness industry. While most people dont think of workout equipment as technology, they can indeed be considered machines that enhance the quality of human activity. The industry is shifting away from these rudimentary tools and leveling up to higher tech solutions that do a better job of improving the body and the mind as a complete unit.

Data from Statista shows that the sporting equipment industry hit $5.12 billion in revenue last year, and everything is pointing to continued growth in 2017. The overall fitness and wellness industry is a much bigger generator of revenue, coming in at over $542 billion.

There is also growing trend of companies offering workplace wellness technologies and programs that are helping achieve, on average, a 6 percent reduction in attrition, with some companies like SAS and Biltmore reporting closer to 10% reduction.Todd Musgrove is an expert in the intersection of fitness and technology. Coming from a background creating apps for fitness, Todd now works as the Chief Strategy Officer for Kenzai,an online fitness platform that incorporates mindfulness and community in its home workout experiences.

He shares, Technology and the internet have made it easier to bring together people and information to develop more comprehensive programs that allow real people to connect, train in the same program, and achieve results together.

Services like Kenzai that provide at home solutions on a subscription basis are becoming more popular with consumers. Many have become frustrated with the one-size-fits-all approach that many home exercise videos and programs initially provided, and are searching for more customizable experiences that match their needs. Musgrove explains that the benefit of online fitness platforms is that, People can train anywhere with an internet connection. Since we function online, we are also able to help people utilize personalized diets prepared by a professional nutritionist. These are services that are difficult for traditional gyms and programs to provide due to the overhead involved with employing similar experts in a single location.

Before wearables, the only way to effectively measure your heart rate during a workout was to hop on a smart treadmill at the gym. Today more than 20percent of Americans have smartwatches or other fitness trackers that help them track biometric data all day, according to research from Forrester. The popularity of these devices is helping users better track and evaluate their performance, making gym visits less important to their overall fitness journey.

Musgrove shares, Genetics and medical testing to tailor exercise and nutrition are coming into practice, and were looking at opportunities to integrate it as it evolves to develop more personalized experience. With the growing popularity of DNA mapping services provided by companies like 23andme and Ancestry, the number of consumers interested in finding out how their genetic makeup impacts fitness will grow in coming years.

It may seem peripheral to the more fitness specific technologies listed above, but its important to consider the impact social media tech is having on the fitness industry. Photo and video sharing platforms are making a trend out of posting your fitness efforts. Social challenges on Facebook drive accountability for participants, and the opportunity to snapchat your run and share it with all your followers is motivation for anyone that wants to be perceived as fit.

These technologies have given rise to more workout programs like mud runs, and other experience-based races. As these companies develop new products like Snapchat glasses that make it even easier to share, people will become more intentional about sharing their workouts.

More and more consumers will be looking for ways to use technology to enhance their fitness efforts in 2017. As a result, fitness companies need to adopt developing tech quickly to reach more customers. Especially those that are digital natives. Trainers also need to consider how tech solutions can support their business, and leverage the growing trend of at-home workouts. As fitness tech improves, the hope is that people will be even more effective with their fitness efforts, achieving a healthier and happier 2017.

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How Technology Is Changing the Fitness Industry Today - Tech.Co

Design and technology GCSE has disappeared from nearly half of schools because teenagers no longer like making things, a survey has found.

Hundreds of schools across the country have axed the subject from the curriculum in the past year alone, according to a poll of teachers conducted by the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL).

Julie Nugent, chief executive of the Design and Technology Association, said the survey results were worrying, adding that they have been inundated with phone calls from concerned parents whose children are not able to take up the subject because their school no longer offers it.

We know that the subject itself suffers from a bit of an image problem, people see it as a craft based subject, where you just make a bird box or something like that, she said.

The most recent figures released by the Joint Council for Qualifications (JCQ) revealed a ten per cent decrease in the number students taking design and technology as a GSCE.

Ms Nugent said that the decline began with the Labour governments removal of the requirement for pupils to study design and technology at GCSE in 2004, but has accelerated in recent years following the introduction of the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) which focuses on a narrow curriculum made up solely of core academic subjects.

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Design and technology GCSE axed from nearly half of schools, survey finds - Telegraph.co.uk

I was exchanging emails with someone the other day and signed off with the sentence let me know when you are next in London or words to that effect. It then occurred to me that I had absolutely no idea where in the world my correspondent lived. This interested me. Because it occurred to me that I could write the sentence next time you are in London to more or less anyone in the world without it sounding ridiculous. Of how many other cities is that true? New York, certainly. But then it gets difficult. Paris or Singapore? Well, at a pinch. It wouldnt work for Perpignan, say, or Bourton-on-the-Water.

This thought experiment helps explain why the many people (including me) who once naively assumed that the internet would make geographical location irrelevant have seen ourselves proved diametrically wrong. (In the late 1990s a shrewd friend of mine in Palo Alto even bought a secluded lakeside plot in the Rockies on the assumption that in ten years time he could live there more or less permanently: no such luck.)

In fact digital connectivity increases rather than reduces the drive towards urban concentration. By greatly extending the range, ease and frequency with which people can form networks, it increases the number of people who need to meet each other in person: such meetings increasingly concentrate in the worlds few megahub cities. So the draw of London is magnified still further.

This distortion happens at a smaller scale everywhere, of course. If you have two offices, with ten employees in Liverpool and six in Preston, you will find that over 90 per cent of all meetings take place in Liverpool. But at a larger scale things get more extreme.

When technology and globalisation break down the buffer of geography entirely, the winner-takes-all effect intensifies. An early manifestation of this came with the invention of the gramophone: in an era of live performance, there was a good living to be made as the fifth best tenor in Denmark; when the gramophone appeared, one man, Caruso, earned the lions share of worldwide royalties.

If you ever wondered why so many of the worlds packaged goods brands have their origins in the American Midwest of the late 19th century, its the same effect at work. Before the advent of the railways, the United States was home to thousands of smaller regional brands. The railways killed this diversity, with the winners overwhelmingly being manufacturers close to the rail hub in Chicago.

Such power laws are sometimes described as the Pareto Principle or the 80:20 rule, the maxim being that, say, 20 per cent of a companys customers account for 80 per cent of its sales, or that 20 per cent of a countrys citizens typically own 80 per cent of the land. But this understates reality. In reality the three most successful tenors might earn 95 per cent of recording fees. Or, as happens now, two or three European cities might attract the majority of overseas property investment. Whats wrong with Lisbon or Rome?

Likewise, the mean salary of an author hasnt changed much since the 1950s. That sounds reassuring until you remove J.K. Rowling and Dan Brown from the total. Every other author is poorer in adjusted terms than their 1950s equivalent.

If the world seems increasingly mad to you, spare a nod for Vilfredo Pareto, after whom the effect was named. Unusually for an economist, he did at least live in accordance with his theories: his final years were spent secluded in an Alpine chalet with a mistress and 20 Persian cats. My guess is that he started off with five mistresses and 100 cats before deciding that 20 per cent of these would give him 80 per cent of the pleasure.

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How technology exacerbates the winner-takes-all effect - Spectator.co.uk

The bull market in stocks has now been running strong for eight full years, and investors who have seen major market benchmarks triple from their 2009 lows were in a reasonably good mood on Thursday. Stocks didn't move much, with the Dow rising just 3 points on the day, as a generally favorable market environment was tempered somewhat by declines in U.S. crude oil prices below the $50-per-barrel level.

Yet even though the overall market remained resilient in the face of some threats to positive sentiment among investors, some stocks posted substantial losses. Stratasys (NASDAQ:SSYS), International Game Technology (NYSE:IGT), and Momo (NASDAQ:MOMO) were among the worst performers on the day. Below, we'll look more closely at these stocks to tell you why they did so poorly.

Shares of Stratasys dropped 9% after the 3D printing specialist released its fourth-quarter financial report. The company said that revenue rose just 1% from year-ago levels, and although it managed to post an adjusted profit of $0.15 per share during the quarter, 2017 financial guidance wasn't quite as upbeat as investors would have liked to see. In particular, Stratasys expects revenue of $645 million to $680 million this year, and even after adjusting for extraordinary items, adjusted net income of just $0.19 to $0.37 per share was also well below the consensus forecast among those following the stock. The promise of 3D printing hasn't translated into lasting gains for investors in Stratasys, and some believe that it won't be able to rebound from share-price declines of roughly 85% since 2014.

Image source: Stratasys.

International Game Technology stock plunged 15% in the wake of the company's fourth-quarter financial report. Total revenue for the quarter was down 3% from year-ago levels, but a big foreign exchange-related gain helped IGT triple its GAAP net income compared to the fourth quarter of 2015. Even after adjusting for one-time items, IGT's bottom line was up more than 40%. Yet investors seem increasingly nervous about International Game Technology's outstanding debt, which includes more than $520 million in senior notes coming due next year and a total of more than $3.8 billion in notes and term loan facilities with maturities of 2020 or earlier. If interest rates do indeed go up from here, then the financing costs associated with IGT's debt could become increasingly difficult to maintain, and that could cause problems for a stock that has been performing extremely well over the past year.

Finally, shares of Momo finished down 12%. The Chinese social networking platform company had been on a huge tear higher after reporting favorable financial results earlier in the week, but on Thursday, investors decided that the stock had run too far, too quickly. Nevertheless, many investors remain extremely positive about Momo, which combines location-based services with social offerings to allow users to meet more easily. In addition, Momo has joined other social media stocks in offering services like live video and mobile marketing, and with expectations for sales to quadruple in the first quarter of 2017 compared to year-ago levels, the Chinese mid-cap could easily keep climbing from here. Moreover, even with today's drop, Momo is still up more than 10% just this week.

Dan Caplinger has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Stratasys. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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Why Stratasys, International Game Technology, and Momo Slumped Today - Motley Fool