{"id":47745,"date":"2019-11-05T04:51:48","date_gmt":"2019-11-05T03:51:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/?p=47745"},"modified":"2019-11-05T04:52:03","modified_gmt":"2019-11-05T03:52:03","slug":"google-is-set-to-acquire-fitbit-for-2-1-billion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/2019\/11\/google-is-set-to-acquire-fitbit-for-2-1-billion\/","title":{"rendered":"Google is set to acquire FitBit for $2.1 billion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Google is planning to purchase the wearable fitness tracker company FitBit for $2.1 billion,\u00a0according to BBC News<\/a>. With the acquisition, Google will now compete directly with Apple and other wearable technology companies, and will gain access to detailed health data from millions of FitBit users.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“With Google’s resources and global platform, Fitbit will be able to accelerate innovation in the wearables category, scale faster and make health even more accessible to everyone,” according to co-founder and CEO James Park. “Google is an ideal partner to advance our mission.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FitBit was an early entrant into the wearable technology market, but has struggled as more competitors have established themselves, and was put up for sale last month. FitBit shares have surged 40 percent in value since Google\u2019s interest was reported early last week. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Google, which has struggled to gain a foothold in the wearable hardware market, the move could create new opportunities. The purchase could give them a chance to develop Wear OS, their own wearable tech operating system. But controversially, and perhaps most importantly, it will give them access to health and fitness data from FitBit\u2019s 28 million users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some\u00a0analysts and observers have suggested<\/a>\u00a0that acquiring the data was likely a central motivation for Google, which agreed to pay $2.1 billion for FitBit, which had a market value of just $1.4 billion last week. But Google, along with other tech giants, has increasingly come\u00a0under fire for privacy issues<\/a>\u00a0in recent years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the deal was first reported, the UK\u2019s Labour Party\u00a0called on the nation\u2019s antitrust authorities<\/a>\u00a0to step in and investigate.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is not just a business deal, it\u2019s a data grab \u2013 and that should worry us all. Any such proposal must be subjected to the most rigorous possible scrutiny and must be fully investigated by the CMA,\u201d Tom Watson, the shadow digital, culture, media and sport secretary, wrote to the Competition and Markets Authority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Watson warned that data on \u201chow we sleep, when we move, what we eat, on our breathing and our heartbeats\u201d would be transferred to a company that relies on micro-targeted advertising for its business model. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both companies have been careful to address privacy concerns. Rick Osterloh, Senior Vice President of Devices and Services for Google, said in a press release<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We will be transparent about data we collect and why. We will never sell personal information to anyone. Fitbit health and wellness data will not be used for Google ads. And we will give Fitbit users the choice to review, move, or delete their data.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And FitBit\u2019s own announcement of the deal stated:

“Fitbit will continue to put users in control of their data and will remain transparent about the data it collects and why. The company never sells personal information, and Fitbit health and wellness data will not be used for Google ads.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it\u2019s unclear if these assurances will be enough for users, who have already voiced privacy concerns, or for regulators.\u00a0Barring any regulatory hurdles, the acquisition would be completed in 2020. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Photo Image by FitNishMedia<\/a> from Pixabay<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Google is planning to purchase the wearable fitness tracker company FitBit for $2.1 billion,\u00a0according to BBC News. With the acquisition, Google will now compete directly with Apple and other wearable technology companies, and will gain access to detailed health data from millions of FitBit users.\u00a0 “With Google’s resources and global platform, Fitbit will be able<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":77,"featured_media":47749,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"subtitle":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[113],"tags":[129,10214],"class_list":["post-47745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-finance","tag-google","tag-user-data"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/77"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rudebaguette.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}