Following a solicitation from the US Army for wearable technology that can predict COVID-19 symptoms in the very early stages and possibly before they begin showing, the Army has awarded the contract to Fitbit. The contract was awarded through the Army’s Medical Technology Enterprise Consortium, which released the request for the new technology in May.
The Army is seeking to combine working tech and advanced algorithms in a proof-of-concept prototype. Fitbit announced on Thursday that they were the recipient of one of the awards totaling $25 million, receiving $2.5 million to develop their prototype. The Army stated that they believe the company is positioned to deliver the goals due to its expertise in wearable technology and its user base of 30 million. Fitbit has been working on the COVID-19 infection algorithm since May and has tested the tech on more than 187,500 volunteers, detecting more than 2,700 confirmed cases.
Read More: Army Picks Fitbit to Develop Wearable Presymptom COVID-19 Detector
