BGR leaked to us that Apple is considering a glucose monitor for the Apple Watch 3, but a new report shows that the CEO himself has quite a vested interest in glucose monitors - so much so that he has been spotted wearing one.
That's the word from CNBC, who has spotted the Apple CEO wearing a glucose monitor while on the Apple campus. This spotting is but one piece of evidence that confirms glucose monitoring in the Apple Watch 3: In February, Cook told students at the University of Glasgow, "I've been wearing a continuous glucose monitor for a few weeks. I just took it off before coming on this trip." With regard to the current diabetes struggle, he said, "It's mentally anguishing to stick yourself many times a day to check your blood sugar. There is lots of hope out there that if someone has constant knowledge of what they're eating, they can instantly know what causes the response...and that they can adjust well before they become diabetic."
The Apple Watch, from its inception, has been seen as a health tracking device for Apple, and health companies have embraced this same vision. Aetna has been giving away the Apple Watch for free to employees and at a discount for insurance customers, while Lockton, Davita Healthcare, and Amgen are giving away the device based on fitness goals set by them. With the spread of the Apple Watch into the healthcare sector, it only makes sense for Apple to continue the healthcare push in order to increase market adoption of smartwatches. Sleep tracking is another way to monitor customer health even further, and despite Apple's silence on the subject, its acquisition of sleep tracking company Beddit is for more than just selling health tracking hardware.
Just last month, CNBC also reported that Apple has a team dedicated to the problem with blood sugar monitoring, so all of these things add up to one conclusion: Apple is extremely interested in this field. We don't know for certain at this point that glucose monitoring will make its way to the Apple Watch 3, but we do know that it will come to the Apple Watch at some point. Something tells me that the time could be as immediate as this Fall.