Intel picks wrist-worn drone as Make it Wearable contest winner

Intel has awarded the $500,000 first prize in its 'Make it Wearable' contest to a group responsible for developing a wrist-worn drone complete with camera.

The Nixie quadcopter is designed to be worn around the wearer's wrist and, when activated, takes off, capturing images of things and places it would be difficult for people to reach. It will be marketed towards rock climbers, with the device returning to the wearer before syncing with their smartphone.

The contest was set up in an effort to put Intel at the forefront of the wearables market for the future, and is designed to find innovative examples of the technology.

Mentioning that the contest was intended to encourage budding entrepreneurs to use Intel chips to create innovative examples of wearable technology, CEO Brian Krzanich said at the ceremony: "This was an experiment to see what we would do in this space and see what kind of creativity we could spawn. The real value in this was the diversity of the teams and ideas."

The $500,000 awarded to the winners will be used to make and market a prototype of the device.

Intel recently acquired Basis, a health tracker startup, and is a part of the development of wearable gadgets with Fossil and Opening Ceremony.

Other finalists in the competition were a device that allowed premature babies to feel their mother's heartbeat while inside an incubator and a pulsing necklace to guide cyclists without them needing to look down at their phone.