#17 Friday Business Nuggets 2 (17/30)
Friday Business Nuggets: 3 tactics, news, businesses, or ideas. Curated by yours truly.
1. Is hanging out with a doctor in a park riskier than going to the grocery store?
C-19 turned the most mundane of activities into high risk operations. Going grocery shopping sure isn’t a pleasure anymore. One must know leave their house with the mindset of a disciplined agent: mask, shield, not touching your face, keeping safe distances, applying hand sanitizer, disinfecting items, etc. The most frustrating part of it? Not knowing how to weigh risks properly. What is the risk of doing X activity? What method of doing said activity is safer?
Cue Microcovid a free web app that allows you to properly calculate the risks of activities by weighing in different variables including location and mask usage. It allows for data-driven decisions regarding your next errand.
2. The smartphone… a medical breakthrough?
We carry them around everywhere and are our mobile office, gaming console, date finder, recipe snatcher, camera… guessed what it is already? Of course you did. Smartphones have been all that for a while, but what I did not see them as was medical breakthroughs. Think about it, the tech manufacturing juggernauts are working relentlessly to improve your phone’s: camera, performance, and battery life. And fitting it all into a sleek design. When you go a level deeper, the research and development is focused on the chips and sensors. Improving them and making them smaller. And just like that, your iPhone’s camera went from taking a selfie to detecting Chronic Kidney Disease. Let’s check some medical breakthroughs made possible by smartphones:
Healthy is a startup that turns your smartphone into a medical device, helping bridge the ever-growing healthcare gap. They do so with a proprietary test kit (that can be delivered to your home) and leveraging your phone’s camera.
With Healthy, you can test for Urinary Tract Infections, Chronic Kidney Disease, track wounds, and do at home checkups for prenatal care.
Biospectal will soon launch an app that allows anyone to measure their blood pressure, by placing their finger on their phone’s camera. People who suffer from hypertension are asymptomatic, so usually the condition is detected when it has already inflicted damage. Early detection is vital in treating and living with hypertension. Once the app launches later this year, we’ll all have a medical grade blood pressure monitor with us all day long.
3. Betting on AR = Betting on social connections: Niantic acquires Mayhem
Remember walking around the city park, looking for Pikachu? Pokémon Go was a global social phenomenon. When was the last time a game actually encouraged us to go outside? I lived in Taipei when it was launched and rest assured if you were in a plaza or park you could ask a passerby what Pokémons were around, and they would know. Everyone was playing it, it really was a tipping point to what an AR (Augmented Reality) experience can do to a city or community.
The genius behind Pokémon Go? Niantic. Niantic is a software development company that specializes in augmented reality games. Before the smashing success of Pokémon Go, there was Ingress. Ingress is an exciting AR game in which you, an agent, can choose between two factions (the Resistance or the Enlightened). The Resistance wants to destroy XM, the strange source of energy that threatens humanity. The Enlightened want to use XM to elevate humans. Although not as popular, it defined the stepping stones and playbook for future projects: Pokémon Go & Harry Potter: Wizards Unite.
Niantic acquired Mayhem and it’s very clear what direction their new developments will take, moving forward. Mayhem is the social aspect of gaming, productized: communites, leaderboards, private and public tournaments, searching for a party, filling parties, etc. Niantic sees the physical world as its gaming universe and Mayhem is the online home for communities that game together. We can expect more social touch points and tribal vibes on AR experiences, which we already know Niantic crushes.
“Our community of creators taught us the importance of designing the right environment, not just creating an ephemeral, multiplayer experience. Persistent environments become a home, a place that bridges the before, during, and after, whenever people play together.”
Ivan Zhou, Co-founder & CEO of Mayhem
What a great acquisition, GG.
Past editions of Friday Business Nuggets
