NTT Data To Monitor Ten Million Hotel Guests And Sell Data About Their Sleep

NTT Data has opened a hotel at which it plans to watch people sleep, as part of a plan to gather – and of course sell – data about the snoozing habits of ten million people.

News of this "innovation" can be found on the Japanese services outfit's website, where an announcement outlines plans to work with capsule hotel operator Nine Hours and Google-owned Fitbit.

Machine translation of the announcement suggests the hotel chain will use a sensor developed by NTT Labs that visualizes internal body rhythms by estimating core body temperature. Infrared cameras, sound-collecting microphones, and body movement sensors will also be present. Guests will also be offered use of a Fitbit device.

NTT Data will use the info produced by the sensor to analyze guests' sleep – if they opt in.

Those who do will be offered a sleep analysis report with customized advice on how to create a sleep environment that matches their personal needs.

NTT will also sell the sleep data – again, with permission. It's not like this is creepy or weird or anything.

The announcement states that food, beverage, and consumer goods manufacturers are considered possible customers, as are pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers.

Personal info will be excised from the data.

• Two sats, one customer: Japan's NTT signs up for Amazon's space internet
• NTT adapts AI network analysis tool to detect faults in nuclear fusion reactors
• NTT will take those SAP licenses off your hands if it helps ease cloud migration
• NTT Data adopting datacenter inspection robots to relieve humans of some chores

NTT Data thinks this can be big business. The announcement states that the tech giant wants to create a ¥30 billion ($203 million) business by 2030, fuelled by sleep data and other personal info it can use to provide personalized healthcare services. It envisions offering "pre-symptomatic treatment" to customers, and even online medical consultations.

The NTT-owned hotel will open in July 2024 at 1-9-36 Konan, Minato-ku, Shinagawa, Tokyo. NTT hopes to deploy its tech in 30,000 hotel rooms – enabling it to record the sleep of ten million people by 2027.

Tokyo has many charms, and your correspondent can heartily recommend a visit. I can also attest that capsule hotels can be quite fun for a night or two.

Feel free to let us know in the comments if a Tokyo capsule that monitors your sleep is your idea of a holiday. ®