ICON fitness & other companies are coming up treadmill, stepper, indoor cycle etc. that can send data over wifi or plugged USB drive or directly to internet. But these machines are expensive & not every professional/personal gym has it.
Completely agree on focusing on "analysis" piece rather than how we get data inside our app.
Comparing with Nike or Runkeeper app or specialized hardware such as Garmin/Sunnto pedometer+watch gets tricky. They target ONLY running. But still let us compare :)
There are dozens of mobile apps for fitness with various feature & price range. (1) Nike app works with external sensor mounted on hardware. Hardware costs $30. Probably runs for 80-100miles, 3-4 months. (2) Some app use on boardGPS some use on board accelerometer such as RunKeeper, but it will not work on treadmill or indoor running (3) App using on board accelerometer (4) Some app allows manual entry of exercise data (5) Garmin/Sunnto professional athlete gear is good in accuracy and shelf life. But it is expensive & cost $120 to $200. Also getting data to PC or online is multi-step process.
Overall, variety of solutions for runners based on their needs. Can our app offer additional value or complete replacement? Nope. BUT are there be ppl who do not want to shell out money to buy Nike/Garmin/Sunto hardware AND use gym machines AND interested to log data, probably yes. How big is the market? I am not sure, and I do not know how to even guesstimate it.
Probably we are better off targeting users of healthcare device such as blood pressure monitor, glucose meter, and such machines. New & slightly expensive machines in market have USB port that allows data downloading to PC. How about offering Smartphone App to allow users to capture data instantly & do all sorts of analytics? No need to plugin your device to PC to download data n analyze. How about we offer our solution to Omron & other device manufacturer for fixed price AND they roll out a free app for their user to instantly capture data giving them competitive edge over other manufacturers in terms of features.