Satellite communicationtools are a big investment. The devices cost hundreds of dollarsand require subscription plans that come with startup costs and monthly fees. They’re a good optionif you’re heading intothe backcountry, where cell service is nonexistent, but the cost of a contract—and the logistics of remembering when to activate and deactivate it for specifictrips—is enough to turn many away. And for those who venture off the grid only occasionally, it may simply notbe worth the expense. A startup called Bivy wants to fix that.
Bivylaunched two years with a flagship similar to for hiking and for climbing. Unlike those apps, however, Bivy isn’t single-sport focused. Pins on the map can representeverything from climbing crags to backcountry ski routesto river put-ins, with detailed course descriptions and information on mileageandelevation gain. Users can filter by activityand even by style (say, ifyou want to find a chute to ski, a crack to climb, or a waterfall to hike to), track their travels, and share their location with friends—at leastwhen in range of acell tower.
Now founder Vance Cook is to launch a satellite communicationtool that will allow users to continue using the app to stay in contact with friends and family when cell signals fade. Shipping in September, the Bivy Stick($300) works like many other sat comm tools(thinkGarmin’s InReach), using the Iridium network to send messages, receive weather updates, and call for rescue via an SOS button. However, the Stick itself doesn’t have a keypad, screen, or physical SOS button. Instead, it uses Bluetooth to to putthose functions on your smartphone’s screen.
The Bivy Stick comes just months after rollout of a similar device, called theSomewear, created by a group of Silicon Valley developers. Like the Bivy Stick, the Somewearacts as a conduit between your phone and the Iridiumnetwork, enabling you to send messages and SOS signals from the backcountry.
What’s different about the BivyStick? It entails nostartup cost, contract, ormonthly fee. Insteadyou buy credits. One credit equals one action (a text, a weather update, a two-hour period of location tracking). The base emergencypackage—ten credits—costs $18, and users pay extra for additional credits.Instead of purchasing a month’s worth of data you may never use, you can get just enough fora few days. The only caveat: the credits expire after 30 days, unless you pay a small feeto roll them over.
In many cases, the monthly plans offered by Garmin will be cheaper than Bivy’s credit system. Garmin’s cheapest plan is $15 per month (plus a onetime $25 activation fee)for ten custom messages, unlimited preset messages, and ten-centlocation pings, and it can besuspended when the device isn’t in use. But theBivy Stick is cheaper than most of its competitors:$130 more expensive than the ($170), but $50 cheaper than the Garmin ($350) and $150 cheaper than the ($450).
With comparativelylow entry costs and a relatively high level of user-friendliness,the Bivy Stick may be ideal for weekend warriorsand dollar-conscious athletes who need to send only a single message or location ping and are turned off by the hassle of frequently activating and suspending a subscription plan—in other words, the very people who might otherwise never invest in a sat commdevice.
Of course, there’s a drawback to a sat commdevice that works through your smartphone: cell batteries die. Bivy addresses this by equipping the Stick with a 6,000 mAh batterythat the company claims can keep a cell phone set toairplane mode charged for three days. The device is 1 by 2 by 5.8 inches, like a larger version of the charger, and could easily take the place of the power pack you already carry in your pack.
We’ll be getting our hands on a test model soonand look forward to putting it through its paces.