Presenter: Professor Leyland Pitt, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada

• How is wearable technology used in everyday life?

• How do consumers benefit from the information that the devices collect?

• What information should be accessible and who can use it?

• How do marketers and firms integrate wearable technology into their information systems practices?

Wearable technology is emerging as one of the key areas companies are investing in. Recently Facebook acquired Oculus VR, and Apple announced its $3.2 billion purchase of Beats Electronics. By 2017, wearable technology is predicted to be worth $10 billion, with 170 million wearable technological devices in general use.

Currently, the biggest area for wearables is sports and fitness – Fitbit tracks and monitors exercise; a Google project uses contact lenses for diabetics to monitor blood glucose levels; the Owlet ankle strap continuously monitors critical health indicators in newborns. However, marketers, IS practitioners, and organisations in general are only beginning to give attention to the potential advantages and pitfalls, and applications of wearable technology. This lecture looks at how firms understand how wearable technologies can be integrated into their information systems practices in ways that enhance customer value, and improve organisational effectiveness. The research develops ways to generalise wearable technology beyond applications such as fitness and medicine, to construct frameworks that will assist marketers and information systems practitioners in understanding and advancing the impact wearable technology has on their firms.

Leyland F Pitt, MCom, MBA, PhD, PhD, is Professor of Marketing and has previously taught on executive and MBA programs at major international business schools such as the Graham School of Continuing Studies at the University of Chicago, the Graduate School of Business of Columbia University, and London Business School, and the Wirtschafts Universitat Vienna/ Carlsson School of Management, University of Minnesota. Professor Pitt has won many awards for research and teaching excellence and is listed as one of Canada’s top MBA professors in the magazine, Canadian Business. Professor Pitt is currently a visiting Erskine Fellow at the University of Canterbury.

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