Yesterday the European Commission (EC) announced that it will open an in-depth investigation into the proposed acquisition of Fitbit by Google. Google agreed to purchase Fitbit in November 2019, but the purchase has not yet been formalised as it is being looked at by Authorities.

Specifically, the EC’s main reason for opening this investigation is:

The data collected via wrist-worn wearable devices appears, at this stage of the Commission’s review of the transaction, to be an important advantage in the online advertising markets.

I think the advertisement angle is interesting and I suggest you read the source article linked below, but there is an additional implication of course, which has to do with how this impacts Wear OS.

Google launched Android Wear - its wearable OS - many years ago, but has frankly not been able to get real traction. Apple Watch is clearly a success and I think we can safely say that the Galaxy Watches are also doing quite well, but Wear OS (as it is called now) has never been a great success despite Android’s clear success.

There are hardware issues that need to be resolved, certainly, but there is also a software and services part. A big part of a wearable is the health tracking and Wear OS with Google Fit just does not have a great solution in place. Buying, and integrating, Fitbit is a possible solution, but that will now have to wait. The question is, how much longer can Google wait before it is just too late for Wear OS?

Source (European Commission): [Mergers: Commission opens in-depth investigation into the proposed acquisition of Fitbit by Google] (https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_20_1446)