How well do you sleep? If you count sheep every night, staring at the ceiling, desperately trying to drop off, or you often snapped awake at 2 or 3 am, you might have been finding a dramatic solution. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that roughly one in three U.S. adults don’t get the recommended minimum of seven hours of sleep per night. Studies done by McKinsey in 2017 also show that some 50 million to 70 million Americans have insomnia, and many don’t have access to effective treatments.
As consumer demand for products that help sleep increases, companies from across the globe gathered to show their gadgets that are designed to enhance sleep in the world’s largest technology exhibition, Consumer Electronic Show (CES). Large conglomerates such as Philips, as well as start-ups that are united with new ideas, are jumping in expanding the sleep industry. Some of them in general has drawn attentions. It runs the gamut from snooze-inducing headphones, smart pillows and beds, belts that track every toss and turn to smartphone applications that improve your circadian rhythm.
A young entrepreneur in South Korea, Kim Dong-sin (CEO of NYX Inc.) also participated in the show this year with his testing mockup which helps restful sleep. Having dreamed of becoming a venture businessman since his school days, he set his mind on developing a technology that can make innovative change in the world and showing it off in this show.
What made him conceive this business plan was his mother. She suffered from sleeplessness, which was a concomitant symptom caused by sudden sensorineural hearing loss. The sleeping pills prescribed by the doctor were effective, but the side effects such as poor memory, overdose, and morning headaches were so significant. He tried every possible means to help her: from aroma diffuser, cushiony pillow, soft bedding to health supplement food. However, these couldn’t be the cure, which made him decide to invent effective technology to improve sleep.
Kim thought that there is limitation on existing sleep trackers which only offer data capture and viewing with basic data analytics. He wanted to make a more practical solution to the rough sleeping problem with differing approach. The ultimate goal of his sleep-inducing technology, ‘gosleep’, includes following three things: to make specific changes to sleep disorders including insomnia, snoring, apnea, sleepwalking, to totally care the whole sleep cycle from falling asleep at night to waking up in the morning, and to provide personalized and on-demand service. Furthermore, by adopting the Internet of Things (IoT), the gadget will become a source of data. The final model will be released by September this year and sales will begin next year.By discovering the cause of drowsiness, Kim came up with plans on how to make it work to people who sleep fitfully. Actually, there are so many reasons which make people feel sleepy: irregular daily routine, accumulated fatigue, and so on. However, in many cases, lack of oxygen in the brain due to carbon dioxide accumulated in a room leads to slow down brain function and weaken connections between nerve cells, which can lead to poor memory or concentration and sleepiness. So he used mainly carbon dioxide to put people to sleep. By making interventions on carbon dioxide concentration, light, temperature, and humidity in a bedroom, ‘gosleep’ will create an enhanced environment for better sleep.
Sleeplessness is now an epidemic-scale problem in high income countries. The maturing healthcare consumers are already seeking approaches that can help enhance sleep. The future of sleep technologies lies in placing the consumer in the centre and building a network of integrated devices and sensors around him/her. However, a collective ecosystem of sleep technologies is lacking. The key point is for companies to work more closely and establish partnership models. Kim is also looking forward to cooperating with global companies which can synergy with his technology. It is expected that his company, NYX Inc., to make a new trend in sleep industry market.
Kayla Hong
Asia Journal
(Los Angeles Times Advertising Supplement)
▲ NYX Inc.
▲ Brand: gosleep
▲ CEO : Kim Dong-sin
▲ http://www.gosleep.kr
▲ nyx@gosleep.kr
▲ +82-10-4612-6090
