This year’s hottest new consumer tech product isn’t apersonal robotor aself-driving car it’s a crib.
Elvie is far from the only company cashing in on parental anxiety.
Between 2018 and 2019, submissions to CES’s Best of Baby Tech Awards increased by 88%.
From the very beginning, the baby-tech industry has been sown in the threat of worst-case scenarios.
Though these updates weren’t necessarily filling a void in what parents needed, they quickly found a market.
“SIDS is terrifying because it’s so unpredictable.”
This will make me feel better and keep my baby safe,'" she says.
But Lesner says that even his final, meticulously considered pick the Nanit Pro is less than perfectly accurate.
“It can be very terrifying,” Lesner says.
The youngest, 3-year-old twins, wore Snuza Hero movement monitors clipped onto their diapers.
But if anything, these occasional mishaps only fortified his peace of mind.
“If the babies stopped breathing, we would be alerted quickly,” he says.
Eventually, baby-tech merchants got a little carried away by the market possibilities.
A$3,000 self-driving AI stroller?
(But be warned: There’s a waitlist for its anchor product, the Ella.)
How about a Bluetooth-connected diaper sensor that spares caretakers from sniff-checking for number twos?
Or what about an AI-powered changing pad?
The startup Woddle is on a mission to bring fresh data insights to the changing table.
The industry meets its target customers at the intersection of some of our most deeply entrenched habits.
Of course, there are baby-product innovations that have seriously improved people’s lives.
And countlessarticlesand testimonials have praised everything from theSnoo bassinetto theDoona car-seat-stroller comboas life-changing.
But optimizing everything doesn’t always make life easier.
It’s a matter of personal preference, she tells me.
A fancy, camera-equipped monitor wouldn’t be able to tell her anything she couldn’t hear for herself.
“I’m already an anxious person,” Guarnotta says.
“I didn’t really want any part of that.”
Kelli Maria Korduckiis a journalist whose work focuses on work, tech, and culture.
She’s based in New York City.
