Tech is cool and all, but have you ever thought about subtle gender biases ingrained in the industry? Recently, the spotlight has been on the much-anticipated Apple Vision Pro, a virtual reality headset that has the internet buzzing with reviews. However, amidst the excitement, a crucial point often goes unnoticed: it’s a total boy toy.
Despite the hundreds of reviews for Apple Vision Pro, nobody seems to acknowledge that it’s a product essentially made for men. Whether it’s Meta or Apple, VC headsets currently have one main use case: gaming. Gaming has historically been a male-oriented pursuit. Indeed, Statista surveys register twice as much interest in purchasing VR/AR headsets among men than women (1).
Lets get this straight: we’re not saying that women shouldn’t or cannot be gamers. In fact, there’s a huge market opportunity in creating compelling videogames with strong female characters and themes geared towards women’s’ interests. We are, however, saying that historically has been a male dominated domain, and that the games currently enhanced by VR are generally ones catered to traditionally male interests.
Don’t take our word for this, though. This recent meme epitomizes it all. In series of wedding shots recently made the rounds on social networks, a smiling, excited groom is depicted next to his bride, who is visibly unamused. The reason? He chose to wear a VR headset to his wedding. The picture says a thousand words (2).
So maybe not VR, but what else is new in hardware? There's WiFi 6, which will make available extremely high speed and low latency internet connections. It’s a big deal, but let's be honest, the only reason you'd need this degree of WiFi perfection is for better gaming.
There's also the revolution in electric cars, with pickup trucks finally coming out in electric versions. Tesla's Cyber Truck just hit the market. Its rad. But you could also go for the Rivian R1 or the pretty impressive electric version of the Ford F150. These trucks are honestly remarkable. Oh, they’re also hella male-forward. Zippa reports that a whopping 89.7% of pickup truck owners are male (3).
Ok, not all tech is totally male coded. Fitness tech is splits pretty evenly between men and women. Whoop appears male-marketed, but the Oura ring skews feminine, with valuable cycle insights as a part of its data outputs. Overall, smartwatches are not inherently gender biased. We found contradictory reports on the gender split of smartwatch users. Some sources report that more men than women own smartwatches (4), while other sources report the exact opposite (5). Whatever the case, we do not think that your run of the mill Garmins and Apple watches are strongly marketed or designed towards one gender.
We cannot say the same thing for ultra-premium smart watches like Apple Watch Ultra or the Garmin Fenix, however. Think about it. These are the sort of devices you would only ever need if you were in some dire extreme survival situation in the middle of an abandoned island in the Pacific. Here’s the description for Garmin’s $1099 tactix® 7 series, from their website: “You want to be field-ready. You want specialized GPS smartwatches with technical features, built-in flashlights, routable TOPO mapping and more (6).” For just $500 extra, you can get a feature called “pro ballistics” which apparently helps you shoot a rifle better. Let’s be clear, the tech in this thing is pretty gnarly. It’s the stuff of a James Bond movie. Still, these gadgets are made for people who fantasize about being a Navy Seal, which is about as macho as it gets. Again, we’re not saying women shouldn’t be Navy Seals, but it’s worth noting that it was only 3 years ago that the first woman joined the Seals (7).
There's just not that much cool tech made for women. Why is the ultra-premium tech targeted more towards men? Women deserve access to equally cool tech with products that can lead the next revolution in tech.
At Aim Colours, we strongly believe that women also like to play with the coolest, cutting-edge gear. There is an untapped market here, and an as yet unrecognized consumer need. We’ve been at tech conferences and VC events. It’s a man’s world out there. Men are making high tech toys for men. We’re totally cool with that. We just think that women also need cool gadgets to play with.
Women want tech too. That's why we're developing state of the art, color changing nails. Users will be able to select a color from their phone and transfer that design onto their nails. Our product brings the latest in display technology to the world of fashion and beauty. We believe in a female-led future, where tech meets fashion.
We’re tapping into a traditionally female market sector. That’s the whole point. We want to bring tech into the king of domain that women are already interested in. None of this is meant to imply that men can’t, don’t or shouldn’t paint their nails. We think everyone would benefit from bringing a little more color into their lives. Still, the fact is that the cosmetics, fashion, and accessories industry is one historically oriented towards women. Our aim is to revolutionize this industry by the latest tech to it.
Men have their electric trucks, VR shooter games, and Swiss Army knife watches. They’ve brought the latest in tech to the toys they played with as children. Think hot wheels, cops and robbers, and Spy Kids. Women like toys too. And they like tech. It’s time to even the field.
References
[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/740747/vr-ar-ownership-usa-gender/#statisticContainer
[3] https://www.zippia.com/pick-up-truck-driver-jobs/demographics/
[4] https://gitnux.org/apple-watch-statistics/
[5] https://www.axios.com/2020/01/13/fitness-trackers-women-wearables
[6] https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/802901/pn/010-02704-20
[7] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1274125