Page 24 - ARUBA TODAY

A24 TECHNOLOGY
Saturday 18 auguSt 2018

Birth control app highlights emerging health tech market

By KELVIN CHAN ral Cycles involving 15,570
AP Business Writer women who used the app
LONDON (AP) — The con- for an average of eight
dom, the pill and now, the months. The FDA said that
smartphone? if the app is used correctly
Natural Cycles, a mobile all the time, 1.8 percent of
fertility app, this month women would get preg-
became the first ever digi- nant over one year. The
tal contraceptive device “typical use” failure rate,
to win FDA marketing ap- which factors in human er-
proval. Women take their ror, was 6.5 percent.
temperatures and track The birth control pill’s failure
their menstrual cycle on rate is 9 percent, while for
the app, which uses an al- condoms it’s 18 percent
gorithm to determine when and 24 percent for fertility-
they’re fertile and should awareness methods , but
abstain from unprotected those figures are backed
sex or use protection. In up by much more long-
effect, it’s a form of the term data.
rhythm or calendar meth- The company’s founders,
od. Elina Berglund and Raoul
The Swedish startup says it’s Scherwitzl, are a married
effective and lets women couple who are both for-
avoid side effects com- A women demonstrates using the Natural Cycles smartphone app, in London, Friday, Aug. 17, mer physicists. Berglund
mon with other methods 2018. was part of a team of sci-
like birth control pills. But Associated Press entists looking for the Higgs
reports of unwanted preg- “Apps are incredibly popu- But FDA approval means tion as medical devices, boson particle at the Euro-
nancies and investigations lar and there’s nothing in- it can be marketed as a though it doesn’t scrutinize pean Organization for Nu-
by authorities in two coun- herently wrong about using mobile contraceptive, giv- many more that merely clear Research, or CERN, in
tries in Europe, where it re- tech to support our health,” ing it an edge in the mo- perform simple tasks like Switzerland. They pivoted
ceived EU certification in said Bekki Burbidge, deputy bile medical apps market, tracking calories. from science to startups
2017, have raised questions chief executive of the Fam- which is forecast to grow Marketing of contracep- when they wrote the algo-
about marketing what is ily Planning Association, a to $11.2 billion by 2025, up tive apps needs to be ex- rithm to help them have a
essentially a health monitor British sexual health organi- from at $1.4 billion in 2016, tremely careful to ensure baby and then developed
as a contraceptive. zation. “But they’re also an according to BIS Research. that women understand an app to tap broader de-
Natural Cycles boasts area that is fairly unregu- The makers of Natural Cy- exactly what they’re sign- mand.
more than 900,000 users, lated and it can be hard cles acknowledge it’s not ing up for and the limita- The app is free to down-
and such fast growth un- to sort the good, evidence- 100 percent effective and tions, the Faculty of Sexual load but the company
derscores risks for regula- and research-based apps some women might still get and Reproductive Health- charges $10 a month to use
tors and concerns among from the bad.” pregnant even if used per- care of the Royal College it. Its claims were called into
health professionals as they The app is similar to hun- fectly. of Obstetricians and Gy- question in January, after
grapple with the rapidly dreds of other period track- The Food and Drug Ad- necologists said in a state- Swedish regulators started
emerging market for mo- ers already available, most ministration regulates apps ment. investigating reports that
bile and digital health ap- of which are aimed at and gadgets that collect The FDA gave its approval 37 women who used it be-
plications. helping women conceive. or track medical informa- based on data from Natu- came pregnant anyway.q

Kroger rolls out driverless

cars for grocery deliveries

and another was in the Currently, Kroger is operat- Dave Ferguson said in a
front passenger seat with ing with Toyota Prius vehi- statement.
a laptop. Both were there cles. During the next phase That is not the only venture
to monitor the car’s perfor- of testing in the fall, deliver- Waymo has in metropolitan
mance. ies will be made by a com- Phoenix. Waymo has been
Under the self-driving ser- pletely autonomous vehi- trying out a service where
This undated image provided by The Kroger Co. shows an vice, shoppers can order cle with no human aboard. bus and light rail riders can
autonomous vehicle called the R1. same-day or next-day de- Cincinnati-based Kroger order an autonomous car
Associated Press
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (AP) — Kroger’s pilot program livery online or on a mo- Co., is partnering with Nuro, to their nearest transit stop.
bile app for a flat rate of a Silicon Valley startup Employees with Valley Met-
At a time when big-box re- launched Thursday morn- about $6. After the order is founded by two engineers ro, the agency that man-
tailers are trying to offer the ing with a robotic vehicle placed, a driverless vehicle who worked on autono- ages Phoenix-area transit
same conveniences as their parked outside one of its will deliver the groceries mous vehicles at Google. lines, are currently serving
online competitors, the big- own Fry’s supermarkets in curbside, requiring custom- “Our goal is to save people as test riders. The project,
gest U.S. grocery chain is Scottsdale. A store clerk ers to be present to fetch time, while operating safely started earlier this month,
testing the use of driverless loaded the back seat with them. The vehicles will and learning how we can has Waymo employees
cars to deliver groceries in full grocery bags. A man probably be opened with further improve the expe- gathering data from test
a Phoenix suburb. was in the driver’s seat a numeric code. rience,” Nuro co-founder drives, the agency said.q