Atlas raises $1.1M to power its Motion Genome Project, a motion database for wearables

In addition to a very cool activity tracking bracelet that we were thoroughly impressed with during its public debut last year, wearable tech startup Atlas Wearables is building a database to identify every unique body movement.

The startup calls this the Motion Genome Project, which sort of harkens back to Pandora’s original music genome project, which was created to identify music and artists with similar sounds and styles. In this case, Atlas wants to use the data behind every body motion to tell you what movement you’ve just made — provided you’re wearing an activity band that’s collecting movement data. With that, it can theoretically tell you when you’re not performing exercises correctly or when you need to do another set to get a full workout while weight lifting.

To push this database forward, Atlas has picked up $1.1 million in seed funding, the startup announced today. Atlas said the new capital will go toward hiring additional engineers and launching its new fitness band gadget to consumers this holiday season. As we previously mentioned, the fitness band can do things like tell you what kind of pushup you’re doing, and the final version will be able to identify 49 other activities that are common to both indoor and outdoor fitness training.

Founded in 2013, the Austin, Texas-based company has raised $1.25 million to date and currently has 10 full-time employees. Atlas’ fitness band faces stiff competition from a slew of established products from Fitbit, Jawbone, Samsung, Nike, and soon, Apple, which managed to poach one of Atlas’ engineers back in June, presumably to work on the Apple Watch’s activity-tracking capabilities.