W|W: The Wearable Weekly – Magic Leap eyes an $8 billion valuation

Welcome to The Wearable Weekly, your trusted guide to all things wearable tech. If you only have time to read one thing about wearables this week, this is it.

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Statistics & Forecasts

Apple Watch can detect an abnormal heart rhythm with 97% accuracy, UCSF study says (TechCrunch)

Android Wear marketshare surpassed by Tizen says Strategy Analytics (Phone Arena)

Pornhub gets half a million VR views a day (MobileSyrup)

Snap has sold around 90,000 pairs of Spectacles so far (Wareable)

HTC shares soar 6% after first quarter earnings, hint at AR future (Barrons)

One in ten Americans plan to buy PlayStation VR (Gamasutra)

Samsung dominates the VR market (Business Insider)

Fossil shares decline after first quarter earnings and impact of Apple Watch leadership (CNBC)

Wearables in Asia grew by 51% last year, with 42 million smartwatches, fitness trackers, and other devices sold (Wareable)

Device announcements

Montblanc launches its first smartwatch (GQ)

Microsoft HoloLens coming to China later this month (TechCrunch)

Microsoft announces its motion controllers for mixed reality (TechCrunch)

Funding & M&A

Apple invests $200M in Corning glass (New York Times)

Google acquires Owlchemy Labs (The Verge)

Apple acquires Beddit (9to5 Mac)

Improbable raises $502M led by Softbank (TechCrunch)

UpSkill acquires Pristine (UpSkill)

Vivid Vision raises $2.2 million to treat sight disorders with VR (UploadVR)

Major milestones

Oculus’ rooms-scale software moves from “experimental” to fully-supported (Digital Trends)

Scope AR brings its enterprise augmented reality authoring platform to HoloLens (TechCrunch)

Cirque du Soleil to use HoloLens to design sets and plan shows (The Verge)

Rumours

Magic Leap may soon be raising, looking at a valuation of $8 billion (Backchannel)

Amazon hints at building apps for AR headsets (Variety)

Magic Leap may soon be ready to put device in the hands of developers (Mashable)

Microsoft patent suggests how AR can help you track your calories (Wareable)

Analysts say Apple’s Corning investment signals future AR glasses & wireless charging tech (9to5 Mac)

Subscribe to The Wearable Weekly

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