Smart clothing is a promising new field in Japan’s crowded textile market.
Tokyo-based Asahi Kasei lags its competitors — it hopes to enter the business as soon as next year — but is looking to catch up by focusing on clothing with medical applications, a segment where the regulatory hurdles are high.
Asahi Kasei will work with U.S. subsidiary Zoll Medical, which makes the LifeVest wearable defibrillator, incorporating the Japanese company’s Roboden elastic wires into wearable devices. Potential applications include critical care and health monitoring. The product will be developed at Asahi Kasei’s textile research center in Japan’s western Shiga Prefecture, and at Zoll’s US research hub.
While Japan’s textile market has plateaued, demand for smart clothing is picking up, offering the prospect of new income streams. According to market research specialist Data Resources, the smart clothing market is poised to surge from 10 billion yen (US$90.3 million) in 2015 to about 400 billion yen by 2021.
Toray Industries, best known for its carbon fiber products, and telecom operator Nippon Telegraph & Telephone have together developed Hitoe, a proprietary polyester material that can detect faint electrical signals from the skin. As well as measuring the wearer’s heart rate during physical activity, the fabric can measure the physical strain on factory workers working in hot environments, for example. Hoping to exploit new sources of demand, Toray plans to begin sales of medical clothing for electrocardiography this year.
Another textile maker, Toyobo, has devised a film-like material it calls Cocomi, which contains a conductive layer that functions like an electrode. It is being tested in wearable products for bus and truck drivers with the aim of keeping them from falling asleep at the wheel.
Kurabo Industries has also announced plans to make smart clothes. In May, the fabric maker began working with a transport operator to test a product aimed at preventing heatstroke.
These and other efforts to bring technology closer to where we live, in a very literal sense, could go a long way toward keeping people healthier, longer.
Kurabo Industries, the fabric maker had also just announced plans to make smart clothes. They were working with a transport operator in May to test a product meant for preventing heatstroke.
From healthcare asia - medical and healthcare news in asia http://www.healthcareasia.org/2017/smart-clothes-invented-to-monitor-healthcare/
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