Apple Watch glucose tracker gets Apple Silicon executive as project lead

AppleInsider

Apple's vice president of platform architecture in charge of developing Apple Silicon, Tim Millet, has been assigned to head the Apple Watch glucose tracker project.

Apple Watch offers essential health tracking

Glucose monitoring is the holy grail of wearable technology that Apple has been chasing for years. If it becomes a reality, it could become an essential product for people with diabetes.

According to a report from Bloomberg, Apple has assigned a new head to the glucose monitoring project after months without a dedicated executive in place. Tim Millet, Apple's vice president of platform architecture, has been tapped for the position.

This team is referred to internally as the Exploratory Design Group, which works on moonshot projects at Apple. The previous team lead was scientist Bill Athas, who died at the end of 2022.

The report says Apple has been developing blood glucose technology since 2011. The technology would use a range of sensors to determine glucose levels with lasers and machine learning algorithms.

Since this technology will rely heavily on miniaturization and advanced chipset design, Tim Millet is seen as a perfect fit for the team. He oversaw the Apple Silicon transition from Intel to M-series processors and has been with Apple for about 19 years.

It may be many years before the Apple Watch or other wearables will introduce non-invasive glucose monitoring. However, if Apple can get ahead of the competition with this technology, it would make the Apple Watch even more of a must-have health product.

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jas99

I really respect Apple’s tenacity in product development. It’s the polar opposite of Google’s approach. 

jeffythequick

I will happily alpha/beta test this.

I love my Dexcom, but non-invasive would be even better!

(also make sure it talks to the insulin pumps too.  Start with Tandem...)

Jeffy

cyberdine 101

I really appreciate that Apple is working on a glucose sensor for diabetics. It will be revolutionary device for millions. But I am hoping that they are working on a blood pressure sensor. It will help out millions more for hypertensives. I will be the first to buy one. I also volunteer to be a beta tester. 👍🏻🙂

kestral

I have never owned an Apple Watch ever but glucose monitoring is the killer app that would get me to buy one, and I'm not even diabetic. If Apple can make this happen, they will sell exponentially more Apple Watches.

jfabula1

Aye Aye, type2 volunteering…..

jellyapple

high risk, low return position. Good luck.

Kierkegaarden

It sounds like Apple has had a team working on this for quite a few years, along with a blood pressure sensor.  They’re taking their time with these, which is a good thing — these won’t be novelty features when they are released.

gwmac

For me at least the holy grail of wearable will be blood pressure monitoring. But if Apple manage to add Glucose monitoring and/or BP monitoring I have to think it would no longer be an accessory but an essential tool that millions more people would buy.

wg45678

For anyone interested, I purchases a low-cost watch from via Temu (one of several different watches with similar features) that is supposed to measure a number of health stats including blood pressure and glucose. Most of the sensors seem reasonably accurate when calibrated against a known, medical grade, device. The exception is the glucose monitor. It’s all over the map by comparison to my  OneDrop meter. Not reliable at all and non-invasive glucose monitoring may be a tough nut to crack. I don’t see what Apple couldn’t include blood pressure with a qualifier that  its for reference only and not a medical device, just like they do with the SpO2 sensor. 

danox

jas99 said:

I really respect Apple’s tenacity in product development. It’s the polar opposite of Google’s approach. 

Apples’s approach doesn’t give it any brownie points with the tech analyst or Wall Street crowd, everything must be an instant lottery or else, almost all of the big ticket items that Apple has done over the years has taken more than five years, and in some cases more than 10 years to execute.