ASICS Corporation, a Japanese athletic equipment company, has acquired FitnessKeeper, the operator of the fitness tracking app Runkeeper, reports Medium. The financial details of the deal were not provided. The app will continue to operate independently post acquisition. As of now, Runkeeper has over 33 million registered users globally. It provides users with notifications of running distance and pace during exercise, other than functions to record, manage and analyze various activities. Established in 2008, the app will now also work with ASICS to integrate its digital fitness platform with athletics products. Adidas and Runtastic: Note that this is not the first such acquisition in the fitness apps market. In August last year, Runtastic was acquired by Adidas for $240 million. The app would retain its entity within the Adidas Group and continue to operate from Linz (headquarters), Vienna and San Francisco. Both the acquisitions make sense for the respective companies. For sportswear manufacturers it makes sense to tie up with apps that specialize in tracking fitness activities, as they could eventually integrate such features within their own products. As we have said before, such partnerships are part of a trend we are going to see as connected devices start becoming a norm. Companies that traditionally offer offline services, such as in transportation, healthcare, sports etc, will tie up with online services to build various connected solutions. Developments in Indian online fitness space: - Earlier this month home services marketplace Housejoy acquired fitness startup Orobind for an undisclosed amount. - In…
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