James Temple

The battle to own digital health will escalate with Google expected to introduce a new service to collect data from fitness trackers and apps. The tech giant’s addition to its mobile operating system, likely to be described in greater detail at the I/O conference in San Francisco, follows Apple’s unveiling of HealthKit, Samsung’s SAMI announcement and WebMD’s launch of Healthy Target. Each is a play to become the consumer platform for health, a one-stop hub for a person’s own biometric data as well as personalized insights and health content.

It’s the latest in a long line of fierce wars for the mobile customer, which have ranged across phone specs, developer loyalty, navigation services, music, media and more.

Health offers the next opening to differentiate operating systems, the next opportunity to tie consumers into ecosystems and the next source of information that can be tapped for consumer insights. To succeed, companies will have to figure out how to deliver something of real, perceivable value (which would seem like an obvious statement but for the litany of copycat devices cluttering the market today).

Better monitoring sensors should lead to more useful health data. For one, a real-time feed of medical data into clinics and hospitals means doctors can be alerted and respond in the event of alarming divergences. Devices that can collect increasingly reliable data at home, including glucose levels, could also be a significant boost for telemedicine, saving people the cost and hassle of going into the physician’s office.

Now throw in genomic data, thanks to plummeting prices of DNA sequencing.

The even bigger promise here is that collecting increasingly complete medical profiles from millions and millions of people, healthy and sick and somewhere in between, will offer fresh insights into the causes and cures for devastating diseases. Everyone will effectively be enrolled in a medical study on a length and scale that we’ve never seen.

A San Francisco startup has developed a wearable device that monitors breathing patterns and a mobile app that suggests adjustments, promising to allow users to control stress levels or otherwise improve their states of mind.

Or as the press release says in a cereal-box-worthy claim, Spire helps people “have a balanced and focused day.”

But the product arrives in a cluttered wearables market where similarly vague wellness assertions have yet to translate into broad consumer demand.

Spire resembles a smooth gray stone, if smooth gray stones came with belt clips. It slips on near the hip and measures respiration by tracking abdominal movement. The smoothness and consistency of breaths as well as the inhalation-to-exhalation ratio can reveal periods of tension, relaxation and focus, the company says. If users take shallow breaths for an extended period -- while, say, grinding through a story on deadline -- the iOS app might remind them to take deep breaths, clear their mind or release tension.

If it sounds more like a yoga teacher than a doctor, that’s no accident. As with most wearables, the company hasn’t earned approval from the Food and Drug Administration, so it can’t make medical-grade diagnoses or weighty health claims.

WebMD is due to launch Healthy Target, a service that collects data from wearables, wireless scales, glucose meters and more to offer up personalized health content and tips. If it sounds like a familiar move at this point, it’s because lots of tech companies are positioning themselves as all-in-one platforms for digital health.

Samsung announced SAMI, Apple trotted out HealthKit, Google is reportedly coming out with Google Fit, Microsoft is still plugging away with HealthVault and Qualcomm Life offers the 2net Platform.

Healthy Target allows consumers to pick among goals like losing weight, eating healthier and controlling blood sugar. It then helps them achieve those aims by recommending lifestyle adjustments, sending reminders and providing encouragement. The service also helps users track their progress by translating health data into easy-to-understand visuals.

The app automatically pulls in information from devices developed by Entra, Fitbit, ForaCare, Jawbone, Telcare and Withings -- in most cases by syncing with the 2net Platform, a secure online health information locker already approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

At the Code Conference, Code.org co-founder Hadi Partovi and Harvey Mudd College President Maria Klawe highlighted the grand challenge of getting more students into coding, particularly females and minorities.

The nonprofit Code.org aims to boost computer science skills by making classes available in more schools. Specifically, they want to make coding part of the core curriculum in education, alongside reading, writing and arithmetic. A growing amount of attention has been paid to getting more students interested in STEM subjects -- science, technology, engineering and math -- but both Partovi and Klawe said the effort is too broadly defined. There are more graduates than jobs in fields like biology and chemistry, but a yawning gap between graduating computer science students and open positions. “It drives me crazy when Obama says we need more STEM graduates,” Klawe said. “Because we overproduce in biology and chemistry in particular, and then they don’t get jobs that use any of that education.” She added that programming skills help students or professionals in any field they choose. “From my perspective, computer science is something that everyone needs,” she said.