French consumer electronics company Withings has launched a new addition to its advanced, hybrid smartwatch range, designed to provide wearers with accurate, around-the-clock health metrics while offering an elegant ‘diver style’ stainless steel design. The lightweight, water resistant ‘ScanWatch Nova’ integrates temperature, accelerometer, altimeter, and multi-wavelength photoplethysmography (PPG) sensors in a compact form factor, delivering a wide range of health data to enable wearers to better manage their health over time. 

 

Nordic SoC enables 24/7 health tracking 

Equipped with Nordic Semiconductor’s nRF52840 Bluetooth® LE SoC to supervise the sensors and provide wireless connectivity, the smartwatch generates a wide range of health data including 24/7 temperature tracking, on-demand electrocardiogram (ECG), heart rate and heart rate variability (HRV), sleep parameters, respiratory insights, activity tracking, as well as menstrual cycle tracking. The nRF52840 SoC’s 64MHz, Arm® Cortex® M4 processor with floating point unit (FPU) provides ample computational power to run the sensor algorithms, while the Bluetooth LE wireless connectivity enables the user to review their daily health metrics, view historical trends, and get insights into their health over time from the iOS and Android ‘Withings’ smartphone app. 

 

  “ScanWatch Nova is a 24/7 hybrid smartwatch that is always connected and allows the user to monitor and understand their health on a deeper level than was previously possible,” says Matthieu Menanteau; Head of consumer products at Withings. “From one wrist-worn device you can detect the onset of illness with day and night body temperature fluctuation tracking, perform a medical grade ECG to detect potential cardiac anomalies, measure your blood oxygen levels, as well as help boost your activity and achieve a more restful sleep.” 

Reliable Bluetooth connectivity and extended battery life 

In typical operation the ScanWatch Nova achieves a battery life of up to 30 days between recharge, depending on the frequency of sensor readings. This extended battery life is in part thanks to the ultra low power characteristics of the Nordic SoC. Nordic’s nRF52840 has been engineered to minimize power consumption with features such as the 2.4 GHz radio’s 5.5 mA peak RX/TX currents and a fully automatic power management system that significantly reduces power consumption. 

“For a hybrid smartwatch designed to be worn 24/7 and be ‘always connected’, reliable Bluetooth LE wireless connectivity and exceptional battery performance were essential,” continues Menanteau. “We’ve used Nordic on previous generations of our products, but the nRF52840 SoC not only provided connectivity we could trust, but also ultra low power consumption in a package size that enabled us to keep the smartwatch’s form factor to a comfortable size for the wearer, while also packing it with a lot of high-end technology and sensors. The documentation and support provided by Nordic was also first class.”

 

• About Nordic Semiconductor