Update: The news was first broken by The Logic. The author regrets failing to attribute to the correct sources.
A new Bell Canada Enterprises (BCE) patent revealed that the telecommunication company is posing itself to target the wearable market.
Filed by Tony Hui, products and services development manager for Bell Canada (according to his LinkedIn profile), the new patent detailed a wearable device tailored to providing emergency services. The device would have sensors that measure heart rate, temperature, altimeter, accelerometer, and fall detection, among others. It could alert the user when it senses a dangerous environment or, in the case of an actual emergency, send out alerts on the user’s behalf. Moreover, the wearable may be configured with an SOS button.
By including a GPS, the device may also be used as a location tracker.
The patent document outlined a number of flexible parameters including form factor and display formats. For example, while it could be configured with an LED display, it could also rely solely on LED alert lights to conserve power.
The inventor also intended to leave the design aspect up to the various manufacturers provided that they meet the functional criteria.
While the market is in no short supply of robust smart wearables, BCE highlighted a common pitfall they share in its patent summary.
“Any of these wearable devices are also not able to independently connect to a cellular network and often require to be ‘paired’ with other devices or must communicate by alternative means, which may inhibit the device’s ability to communicate with remote devices, respond to an emergency, etc. As such, the functionality of existing wearable devices is limited.”
To mitigate this issue, BCE’s wearable patent explicitly required the device to be able to connect to a low power wide area network (such as LTE-M) without a parent device.
BCE hasn’t yet announced arrival time or any specific partnerships with device manufacturers.
