Misfit, the up and coming fitness tracker company that came out of a 2012 Indiegogo, has been acquired by traditional watch maker Fossil for a reported $260 million. In the press release, CEO and founder Sonny Vu says:
"We are thrilled to join forces with Fossil Group to usher in the next era of wearables where elegance, beauty and long-lasting wearability are paramount."
As the proud owner of a Misfit Flash (they sucked me in with their original Pebble support), I find this acquisition to be fundamentally fascinating. Imagine traditional watches that have all the sensors of a Misfit, built in and invisble at a surface level. I do foresee Misfit's Beddit and Bolt products to sunset some time next year. Beddit, Misfit's dedicated sleep tracking system, may be an innovative product, but it has nothing to do with Fossil's clear ambition for an expanded connected wearables platform. A similar theory corresponds to Misfit's Bolt connected lightbulbs, which I'm sure will have little to do with anything in Fossil's roadmap. 2016 should be a very interesting year for wearables and it appears that Fossil wants to buy in and include themselves in the connected wearables dialogue.