Under Armour is quickly and quietly becoming the worldwide leader in digital fitness. In March, the company opened up a technology division in Austin, and since then they have acquired four companies, the latest being Gritness.
Gritness is an app that offers users a search engine to find local group workouts based upon what they are looking for. Additionally, Gritness allows users to more easily organize group workouts in their nearby area. The company is based in Austin and is the second Austin-based corporation acquired by Under Armour.
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Under Armour’s technology division, aptly named Connected Fitness, has splashed over $710 million in order to attain MyFitnessPal, MapMyFitness and Endomondo, according to MediaPost’s Laurie Sullivan.
As opposed to Gritness’ unique search engine, all three of these focus on tracking and analyzing fitness and health—so taking data and examining it. They have proved popular and successful for Under Armour too, with Under Armour holding a steady 5,000 app downloads per hour, across all of their platforms.
However, these acquisitions are only the tip of the iceberg for Under Armour and their Connected Fitness. Under Armour hopes to make their own wearables within the year, and they are working on creating clothing with conductive materials, so there will be no more need for wearables.
In April, Under Armour announced an extended partnership with German software company SAP, which will see them to try to develop a consolidated experience among their many different apps.
Quickly and quietly, Under Armour is putting all of the cogs in place to become the face of technology-based health and fitness.