Computer Couture

It might make you look a little like a cyborg, but $4,000 or so can buy you about four pounds of equipment that you strap to your head and belt, giving you a fully functioning, wearable computer.

The president of a Fairfax company that is the industry leader in the emerging field of wearable computing says it is a trillion dollar market and will quickly replace the Palm Pilot and other personal digital assistants that have become popular in recent years.

"Wearable computing is inevitable," Edward G. Newman, president of Xybernaut Corp., said at Wednesday's International Conference on Wearable Computing.

He acknowledged that some people perceive wearable computers as odd and funny looking, but he said the technology is getting smaller and sleeker, and that some fashion institutes are starting to make accommodations for the equipment in their designs. He also said that Sony Walkman headphones seemed strange to consumers 20 years ago.

And he admitted that everyday consumers won't be lining up to strap computers to their bodies in the near future. But he said a strong market exists now for commercial and industrial uses, and consumers will come around in the next few years as the product improves.

Xybernaut's newest model, for instance, is 40 percent smaller and a thousand dollars cheaper, staring at $3,995. It contains a 500-megahertz processor, which has twice the power of its predecessor.

Still, a headset with a slightly menacing eyepiece is a necessity, unless you opt for a smaller flat screen that you can attach to your wrist.

"People say, 'Well, you wouldn't wear it to a cocktail party.' That's true, but you wouldn't wear a welding mask to a cocktail party either. It's a work tool, and for the next year or two years, that's where the market is at," Newman said.

Xybernaut has sold about 1,800 of its Mobile Assistant wearable computers since they debuted in 1999. Its largest customers include FedEx and Bell Canada, which equips its technicians with wearable computers to assist them as they make repairs in the field.

British Airways recently completed a pilot program in which agents used wearable computers to try to speed up the check-in process.

Project manager Karl Brooks said the program had mixed results.

"We didn't get any negative comments from staff about the concept," he said. "They thought the headgear was too bulky. They thought the CPU (central processing unit) generated too much heat."

Travelers also had mixed opinions, he said, including one woman who thought the computers were "beastly" because they obscured the ticket agent's face.

While northern Virginia is littered with the corpses of companies that promised to offer the Next Big Thing in high technology, Newman said Xybernaut's future is strong. The company increased sales from $7 million in 1999 to almost $10 million in 2000, and it has partnerships with major corporations including IBM
and Texas Instruments. It also holds morthan 600 patents or pending patents in wearable computing technology.

"The new products are able to rival the power of laptops and desktops," he said. "We believe the wearable PC is ready now."

By Matthew Barakat
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