Samsung Galaxy S5
This Friday, Samsung is launching a new version of its latest smartphone, called the Samsung Galaxy S5 Sport. The new phone was developed in partnership with Sprint and MapMyFitness, which was acquired by Under Armour for $150 million last year.
Samsung added a textured shell to the Galaxy S5 Sport so that users might benefit from the added grip. The phone will also be dust and water resistant. Like the regular S5 phones, this one also has a heart rate monitor embedded on the back.
The smartphone will come preloaded with a new fitness app, called Activity Zone, but will also offer Samsung’s S Health app. Activity Zone is a tool for those doing outdoor activities. The app will offer a barometer, compass, flashlight, and stopwatch on the main screen. S Health offers users a platform that aggregates health data from different health devices to help them track their health and fitness progress.
The Galaxy S5 Sport will also offer wellness-branded content, developed by Sprint, called Sprint Fit Live. Owners of the device can use Sprint Fit Live to read health and fitness articles on an app, called Live the Healthy Lifestyle, and customize the look and feel of their fitness tracking, education, music, and health information with wallpaper or a full-screen views.
Through this partnership with Sprint, users of the S5 Sport get access to 12 months of a MapMyFitness MVP membership. The MVP membership offers extra features on top of tracking fitness including customized audio coaching, training plans, and live tracking. Customers who are on Sprint Family plans also get six months of Spotify premium, while other Sprint customers get three months of Spotify premium. Even after this period of time, through this partnership, those using Sprint Fit Live can access Spotify's workout playlists.
After a software update to the S5 in May, Samsung added a stress tracking feature to its S Health app. If users want to track their stress levels, they can use the heart rate monitor on the back of the phone to help them do so.
In September, Sprint announced another big digital health project. The company launched a three-month digital health accelerator in Kansas City in partnership with Techstars. The accelerator was looking for “any tech-powered start-up who [had] an innovative idea for a product and/or service that [would] propel mobile health forward” and that were already “well-rounded”.
Sprint isn't the first mobile operator in the US to show off fitness apps on a Samsung Galaxy smartphone, Verizon Wireless ran advertisements to that effect two summers ago around the same time Samsung's S Health app was first unveiled.
