There Are No Easy Answers When It Comes To Hardware In Fitness Startups

I had the opportunity to speak with Jacob Rothman, co-founder of Perch, about the challenges of developing better fitness hardware technology. Perch aims to bring its users information about “the quality of their movement and what they can do to move faster, stronger, more efficiently, and with less pain.”

Jacob Rothman, co-founder of Perch.

Frederick Daso: Why use a camera to track a person versus sensor-based equipment?

Jacob Rothman: I guess it would depend on the shape of the sensor, but fundamentally it’s all about quality of movement. A single sensor, for instance, an accelerometer in the form of a wearable device, can only collect an insufficient set of data. You’re not getting an entire picture of the quality of movement. Right now, the data we are receiving is pretty necessary. We mainly look at an image, pick out the barbell in the picture, and we can tell you your sets, reps, velocity and power output. You might be able to do that with just an individual accelerometer, but that doesn’t give you the ability to scale into other movements.

For instance, what if you want to track dumbbell curls, which are using both hands? What if you’re going to follow joint angles to monitor an individual’s form? You can’t do all these things with just one sensor, and you need either multiple sensors or embedded…