ZWear.org, an organization of wearable experts, has today announced the launch of its Kickstarter campaign to bring the ZWear turnkey wearable device development kit to life
ZWear.org has officially announced the launch of a Kickstarter Campaign to fund production of the ZWear wearable platform. As wearable technology begins to come into its own, ZWear is set to be an immense success, enabling manufacturers, developers and even individuals to create unique wearable devices with its OTA coding. A pledge of just $25, which is only one-fourth the price of other popular wearable brackets on the market, will reserve one ZWear standard kit at an exclusive Kickstarter price.
The concept behind this Bluetooth BLE 4.0, accelerometer and GPS-ready device is to create a platform to speed up the development of wearable devices. ZWear is the size of a quarter, includes a 3-axis accelerometer and is GPS ready. Even with the rechargeable battery, ZWear can still fit comfortably inside a watch body. The inclusion of Bluetooth 4.0 BLE technology ensures that ZWear can communicate with other Bluetooth-enabled devices, including iPhones.
There are many development kits already for Bluetooth BLE technology, however most are expensive and require specialized software and experimental engineers, which may too costly for individuals, or startups to develop to develop their own wearables.
"We developed ZWear for wearable enthusiasts." said Yurong (Kevin) Xu, PhD., who is co-founder of ZWear, "ZWear is FCC certified, features a gold-plated PCB and requires no firmware development. ZWear is ready to go right out of the box. And most important of all, the price is affordable, so that all wearable enthusiasts can buy one and have a chance to make their own wearable devices."
The platform supports, for the first time, Over-The-Air (OTA) Coding with ZOS firmware embedded, featuring ZOS IDE, the first IDE runs on the iPhone and iPad, supported by ZhiOS Labs, which allows access to the source file of firmware for modification and programming via a mobile Apple device. This provides fast customization of ZWear firmware for any wearable applications in mere minutes.
ZWear intends to offer different configurations for the company's wearable platform. The standard ZWear kit will contain the main board, accessories and a lithium-polymer battery. The prime kit will add the GPS module, while the professional kit will include USB debugger.
