Dive Brief:
- In the past few months Apple has posted several job openings for biomedical engineers and a lab technician. Since October 2015, the company has hired at least five people with medical research and development experience, BuzzFeed reports.
- A similar pattern was seen in 2014 when Apple was working on its first version of the Apple Watch.
- The development raises questions about the role in digital health is Apple is working toward, drawing speculation about whether the additional medtech expertise is for the Apple Watch, or perhaps related add-ons.
Dive Insight:
Industry watchers suggest the move means Apple is looking to increase its profile in digital health, although the company has previously said it was not interested in turning the Apple Watch into a medical monitoring device to the degree it would require FDA approval because that would slow down its innovation process.
The new hires could indicate the company has changed its mind, or is working on a separate medical-grade version of the watch, or something else entirely.
Company CEO Tim Cook was vague on details in late 2015 when he told The Telegraph, “We don’t want to put the watch through the Food and Drug Administration process."
"I wouldn’t mind putting something adjacent to the watch through it, but not the watch, because it would hold us back from innovating too much, the cycles are too long," he said. "But you can begin to envision other things that might be adjacent to it — maybe an app, maybe something else.”