Biometric and biomechanics data is streamed via Bluetooth in real-time
Textiles manufacturing startup Nextiles is launching into the sports and performance market to provide smart thread technology that captures biometric and biomechanics data.
Nextiles blends traditional sewing techniques with printed circuit boards to make flexible material with sensors embedded within fabrics, such as everyday sportswear. Through its patent-protected manufacturing process, Nextiles’ fabrics allow for complete biomechanic and biometric sensing captured on one platform.
Nextiles leverages the use of traditional sewing machines and commonly found threads, such as nylon or spandex. The threads used are semi-conductive, which measure mechanical changes from multiple data points. Nextiles differentiates its suite of data analytics by providing Newtonian measurements through its fabrics (force, bending, stretching, velocity, pressure) to offer athletes and teams data such as torque, power, fatigue, strain, and much more. The fabric captures traditional measurements as well by combining force data with IMU technology (direction, speed, distance).
Nextiles provides clients with application programming interfaces (APIs) and software development kits (SDKs) to stream data via Bluetooth in real-time and offers the ability for data to be stored locally and in the cloud.
“Modern sewing technology is almost 2,000 years old, but the industry in recent decades has been overlooked because our society believes we maximized its utility,” said George Sun, CEO of Nextiles. “However, at Nextiles, we are rekindling textile innovation, and more importantly doing it in what was once the sewing capital of the world, New York. One of the reasons we value fabrics over traditional circuit board technologies is our philosophy of building from the bottom-up – thread by thread. Our industry has coveted smartphones so much that we have grown to become content in wearing them as watches and straps. Rather, we should instead endow such powers to what we are most familiar with. Revolutionize our clothes, instead of miniaturizing computer chips, by building on top of generation and time-tested fabric materials.”
While Nextiles is leveraging apparel as its first platform, the company sees broad technological applications and is working with several OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) in various business verticals, such as automotive, military, and fitness.
“We’ve seen our technology become incorporated into more than just garments, but as solutions for a variety of inter-related industries,” Sun continued. “If it can be sewn, it can be smart. To date, we have several ongoing projects and collaborations in sports performance quantifying movement which would otherwise be impossible with camera vision or accelerometers, because we literally form around the 3D complexities of human movement. With that, we’ve also seen interest from OEMs in augmenting their current product offerings by taking their soft-good products and pushing them into the IoT world. I am excited to share this technology with our manufacturers and athletic partners because there is an internal gratification among our team when someone can own their own data through their own clothes.”
Backed by the National Science Foundation, Nextiles was founded in 2018 while Sun, a trained biological and electrical engineer, was finalizing his PhD in biomaterials at MIT. While working at MIT’s Comparative Media Studies, Sun was recruited to lead the embedded engineering team at PUMA, with a focus on incorporating sensors into footwear.
Through his work, Sun was inspired to recreate the sensor industry and provide a superior form factor by developing a now-patented technique to sew sensors directly into fabric.
Newlab – a community of over 800 entrepreneurs, engineers and inventors applying transformative technology to solve the world’s biggest challenges – approached Sun to join and reinvigorate the textile industry by innovating locally. Today, Nextiles is based at the Newlab headquarters in Brooklyn’s Navy Yard. Nextiles also maintains a cut-and-sew studio in New Jersey as well as an award-winning industrial design team based in Manhattan.
“Newlab is home to over 160 member companies applying transformative technology to solve the world’s biggest challenges,” said Shaun Stewart, CEO of Newlab. “Early on during the pandemic, we reopened our doors to ensure that many of our community members, including Nextiles, could continue to have access to our resources, facilities, and product realization support in order to continue their critical work. Nextiles’ successful launch is a testament to their founder’s visionary leadership, their incredible team, and the power of the Newlab community to enable technology with industry-transforming potential.”