I’ll be honest, hearing about what Raybaby does made me happy I don’t have kids. The mere thought of needing a device to monitor a child’s breathing stresses me out. But it’s a legitimate concern, and the Hax graduates are offering a solution that may well provide some extra peace of mind for concerned parents of newborns.
“Currently there are tons of baby monitors on the market that give you a ton of endless data that has no meaning,” co-founder and CEO Ranjana Nair told TechCrunch, “and there are vital monitors that require you to put trackers on the baby’s body.”
Raybaby’s system utilizes radar to detect minute movements in a sleeping child’s chest to determine how much they’re breathing. The system, which looks like a relatively nondescript baby monitor, is designed to be kept as far as eight feet away, on a wall or bookcase.
From that distance, it’s able to detect chest movements down to 0.5 millimeters, determining the sleeping child’s respiratory rate with more than 98 percent accuracy, according to the startup. The system sends alerts to a connected app if a problem is detected. It also serves as a basic sleep tracker, telling the parent how long the baby has slept and sending an alert when it wakes up or turns over.
Oh, and since this is 2017, the system also builds a photo/video collage of the baby for posterity. Because a little social networking never hurt the case of a startup looking to crowdfund a new piece of hardware.
The system, which is supported as part of Johnson & Johnson and HAX’s joint health initiative, hit Kickstarter recently and has already surpassed its goal. Early supporters can still grab a unit for a $129 pledge, with shipping scheduled for September.
