Jabil and Clothing+ Introduce Smart Garment Solution

December 1, 2015 | By Business Wire News

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla.

Jabil Circuit, Inc. (NYSE:JBL), an electronic product solutions company, and Clothing+, acquired by Jabil in June 2015, introduced Peak+™, an innovative smart garment reference design for building an integrated textile Heart Rate Monitoring solution today at the Wearable Tech Show USA in Santa Clara, California. Jabil and Clothing+ partnered with Suunto, a manufacturer of heart rate monitors; and Firstbeat, a provider of physiological analytics for sports, fitness and wellbeing.

“Building an integrated textile Heart Rate Monitoring solution today requires very different competencies and capabilities, which often turn into a guessing game between multiple vendors trying to piece it all together,” said John Dargan, Jabil senior vice president. “With Peak+™, we’re offering customers in the fitness, fashion and healthcare markets a strong competitive advantage with a unique, custom solution that gives them easy entry into the high-growth wearables market.”

The Peak+™ solution includes:

Clothing+ textile-integrated electronics that disappear into fabrics for optimum comfort, durability and convenience;
Suunto wireless transmitter that transfers accurate measurement data collected from garment sensors to a smartphone app, providing easy access to tracked HRM data;
Firstbeat research-based, patented analytics of HRM data delivering deep insight and actionable feedback into stress, recovery and effects of physical training; and
Jabil’s broad industry ideation, design, manufacturing and supply chain expertise, along with a mature global footprint and the ability to bring quality products to market quickly and reliably.

As the E-textile industry’s first reference design, Clothing+, Suunto, Firstbeat and Jabil are taking time and risk out of smart garment development. Throughout each step of the highly customizable design and development process, regular testing takes place to ensure accurate measurement collection.

Finland-based Clothing+ brings nearly two decades of experience in textile-integrated electronics. The company has helped major brands, including adidas, Garmin, Salomon and Philips, achieve first-to-market status with highly differentiated smart textile products.

Since its acquisition of Clothing+, Jabil has bolstered the organization’s global manufacturing and distribution while increasing staff and facilities worldwide. A new research and development lab near Jabil’s Florida headquarters will enable Clothing+ researchers to build on their pioneering E-Textile work. Jabil also has expanded Clothing+’s engineering, business development and manufacturing capabilities to meet increased customer demand.

Supporting Quotes:

Kim Scheffler, Director Garment Development, adidas Digital Sports

“Winning in the fitness wearables space demands both first-to-market timing and a compelling product. Launching the adidas miCoach Elite Team System required many points of integration and multiple partners working together throughout the ideation, design, testing and manufacturing phases. Clothing+ was a true partner for every step of the development and commercialization of the TechFit Elite sensing garment.”

Dr. Harry Zervos, Principal Analyst, IDTechEx Inc.

“The textile-integrated biosensor market for medical/health/lifestyle applications is attracting a significant amount of attention while at the same time being laced with many intricacies. The combination of Clothing+ and Jabil stand out in the field by offering a one-stop shop that lets companies move quickly from research to pilot, to mass production.”

Supporting Resources:

About Jabil

Jabil acquired Clothing+ in 2015. Jabil is a global product solutions company providing comprehensive services to electronics and technology companies in a broad range of industries. With 180,000+ employees across over 100 sites in 26 countries, Jabil helps customers turn ideas into products with our wide range of strategic design, manufacturing and product management capabilities; allowing customers to think beyond their conventional marketplace and explore new opportunities. Jabil helps bring products to the market faster and more cost effectively by providing intelligent digital supply chain solutions around the world; empowering companies to be the change agents in their industries. Jabil common stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “JBL.” Further information is available on the company’s website: jabil.com.