Before a wave of layoffs shut down Amazon’s Halo division, the team behind the products had developed ambitious, long-term plans to better compete in the fitness and health space. Through discussions with current and former Amazon employees, the edge I learned that Amazon had a roadmap for Halo that included a cutting-edge AI-powered fitness coaching service, celebrity-led workout classes, and more.
Amazon’s Halo brand debuted less than three years ago and offered mass-market health and wellness tools designed to take on Apple, Samsung, Fitbit, Garmin, and other competitors. First came the distraction-free Halo Band, then the Fitbit-like Halo View, and most recently the Halo Rise smart bulb. But after exorbitant sales, last week Amazon abruptly exited the Halo business, stopped offering all three devices, and announced that existing units would be retired this summer.
For some clients, the news felt sudden. As recently as March, Planet Fitness was still partnering with Amazon to distribute free Halo View fitness trackers to eligible gym members. The staff was caught off guard, too: They were working toward Halo’s biggest expansion yet. Later this year, Amazon was planning to offer an overhauled Halo Digital subscription service. It is set to include an advanced AI-powered fitness trainer and celebrity-led fitness classes. The company also decided to branch out and support the Apple Watch with its upcoming software.
None of that will happen now. In an internal email saw it the edgeAmazon said it is dropping the category due to “significant headwinds, including an increasingly crowded sector and an uncertain economic environment.”
But until recently, even amid disappointing hardware sales, it seemed Amazon was still determined to move forward. The foundation of the plan was a revamped Halo mobile app with deeper customization and more powerful training tools. the edge He’s got in-house prototypes for the now-cancelled Halo software update.
In a moment of serendipity, bloomberg I recently reported that Apple is developing an AI-based health coaching service that aims to keep users motivated as they pursue exercise, diet, and sleep goals. Codenamed Quartz, this paid offering could make its way to consumers in 2024.
It turns out that Amazon was working on a similar concept for Halo before everything went sideways. Codenamed Donna, the project involved a “Halo AI Trainer” that uses computer vision to evaluate a user’s workouts and monitor their progress — an approach some fitness apps have already attempted.
Similar to Apple and other competitors, Halo Fitness courses already have the ability to display real-time metrics like heart rate and intensity zones, but the app can’t analyze movement or ensure that exercises are performed correctly. This is where computer vision (and your phone’s built-in camera) will come in. “These workouts will be led by trainers, but unlike traditional Halo Fitness workouts, check-ins are enabled with computer vision and add form tracking, rep counts, and detailed performance metrics in a post-workout summary,” reads an internal Amazon document.
Some Amazon employees were less than impressed with the camera’s view of the AI trainer
But within the company, early beta feedback about the AI trainer’s performance hasn’t been overly positive, and even Amazon employees have expressed pauses about having a camera analyze them and share data with Amazon during exercise routines.
Halo Digital was initially scheduled to launch at Amazon’s Fall 2023 Showcase at $7.99 per month. Perhaps realizing that Halo’s original point-based activity tracking wasn’t as enticing as the accolades and accolades offered by Apple and Samsung, Amazon intends to provide more opportunities for incentivizing the service by adding milestones, achievements, and badges.
To drive plan adherence and habit formation, clients will earn badges and awards for streaks/achievements/milestones, be able to easily schedule workouts using reminders, and make workout day adjustments based on duration, preference (eg, cardio instead of strength), or their energy levels. current,” reads internal Amazon documentation on Halo Digital.
The documents also show that the company has been pushing to expand the selection of premium, Peloton-like interactive fitness classes available to subscribers. Team Halo aims to release “20 pieces of new content every week” in 2023. Amazon has enlisted celebrities to record rehearsals at the Halo studio in Seattle. Competing with meditation apps like Calm was also on the agenda: Amazon enlisted John Stamos and Eva Longoria to record bedtime stories for Halo Digital. This work is pretty much done and in the box but has now been completely scrapped.
Looking deeper into the future, the team saw achievements for Halo Digital in the health insurance industry – and potentially a health and wellness benefit for the company’s workers. “We are exploring Halo as an employee for Amazon, and will engage employers to offer Donna “as a benefit they can offer to employees,” the documents say. “As we build evidence of Donna’s impact, we will begin discussions to collaborate with health plans and self-insured employers to offer Donna as a covered benefit through 2024 years. the plan.”
Interestingly, Amazon was also hoping to broaden the appeal of its Halo program by offering Apple Watch and HealthKit support, which would have allowed Apple smartwatch owners to participate in the same subscription-based training as Halo device owners — while filling in their rings and beating them, too. Typical Apple business goals.
Tough competition aside, the Halo Band and Halo View both came with their own hardware issues that prompted customer complaints. In the case of the scope, the plastic covering its sensor array can detach from the device. Halo View, meanwhile, had a tendency to easily slip out of scope or cracks appear at the point where tracker and band meet.
Amazon was aware of the latest flaw and quietly updated the display’s design to fix it, according to our sources. At times, the company has briefly halted Halo marketing to resolve issues, which stalls the momentum further as new competitors arrive.
The Halo Band and View each have average review scores of just under four stars on Amazon, while the company’s more established product lines, like the Fire TV and Echo speakers, regularly hover around 4.5 stars. But the mixed reception hasn’t stopped Amazon from pushing the Halo lineup onto shoppers. Customers who have asked Alexa fitness-related questions like “What’s a good yoga mat?” It will be segmented and targeted with Halo ads. The company has acknowledged that it does this sort of thing, but that doesn’t mean customers are necessarily aware of it.
“The amount of data Amazon has collected on Halo customers is incredible,” said one of the sources. “While we never looked at individual user data, we could see what percentage of people had used each aspect of the product and created collectives to target based on usage. We also closely tracked competitor sales on Amazon to make product decisions.”
But none of this data was enough to turn things around. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has been aggressive about scaling back unreliable money-making efforts for the company. Even as the well-known Alexa and Echo teams felt the effects of Amazon’s cuts and far-reaching layoffs, Halo didn’t stand a chance.
The company now finds itself with a massive inventory of unsold Halo products. According to people familiar with the matter, Amazon has over 500,000 Halo View and Halo Rise devices remaining. Perhaps this explains the recent upgrades to the gym.
Before posting this story, the edge Amazon made several of its key points to allow the company to comment on or refute anything it deems inaccurate. “We don’t have anything to share other than our statement and blog post,” company spokeswoman Kristi Schmidt wrote in an email.
My colleague Victoria Song gave a good explanation Why Halo flopped: Amazon was terribly late to the party, and the few software features Halo offered — such as voice tone analysis and 3D modeling of a user’s body — came across as more exotic than practical.
Halo’s body fat calculator had its proponents and was scientifically sound, but also sparked body dysmorphic concerns. The “tone” sound analysis, while certainly unique, blew up the Halo Band’s battery life. Let’s face it: There’s also the basic fact that some people worry about having their health data stored with Amazon in the first place.
Above all, as the internal email showed, Halo was a small fish in a big pond, and Amazon had little chance of breaking through. It seems the company eventually realized that even Halo Digital wouldn’t be enough to beat such entrenched competition.