I don't think Apple will imagine it like a shrunken down and terrible attempt at a smartphone that straps to your wrist. I think it will be more like an accessory that does things your iPhone cannot do at all or cannot do without the assistance of this accessory. Especially for the fitness crowd, $200 is cheap.
One thing with the fitness idea is that Tim is on the board of Nike which makes the fuelband so they'd end up competing with that. Plus that fitness bracelet lasts a week on battery. As soon as Apple puts a multi-touch display and fast enough CPU/GPU on a watch, the battery life is going to be close to a day - this was the case with the iPod Nano watch and that couldn't even run 3rd party apps.
Having to charge a watch every day isn't really common with watch wearers. Watches are pretty much designed to never need charging.
The Nano or Shuffle are better suited for music while running.
It needs to have a unique selling point. Everything Apple sells has features that can be put up on a poster. I very much doubt that they'd sell a watch as a fitness accessory or even a navigation product, certainly not a music player. I also think the top of the wrist isn't very ergonomic. If this is a device for prolonged use, having the display on the inside of the arm would be far more comfortable but then it loses the aesthetic.
One thing with the fitness idea is that Tim is on the board of Nike which makes the fuelband so they'd end up competing with that. Plus that fitness bracelet lasts a week on battery. As soon as Apple puts a multi-touch display and fast enough CPU/GPU on a watch, the battery life is going to be close to a day - this was the case with the iPod Nano watch and that couldn't even run 3rd party apps.
Having to charge a watch every day isn't really common with watch wearers. Watches are pretty much designed to never need charging.
The Nano or Shuffle are better suited for music while running.
It needs to have a unique selling point. Everything Apple sells has features that can be put up on a poster. I very much doubt that they'd sell a watch as a fitness accessory or even a navigation product, certainly not a music player. I also think the top of the wrist isn't very ergonomic. If this is a device for prolonged use, having the display on the inside of the arm would be far more comfortable but then it loses the aesthetic.
There no problem plugging your watch in daily. There was a time people didnt plug a phone in. Now you do. People adapt. You take your watch off at night, plug it in, and put it on in the morning. Done deal.
There no problem plugging your watch in daily. There was a time people didnt plug a phone in. Now you do. People adapt. You take your watch off at night, plug it in, and put it on in the morning. Done deal.
People always charged phones. Here's an old phone:
6 hours talk time. You'd have to charge old phones less frequently, say every 3 days but nobody ever charges watches (you may have noticed the lack of charging ports on them). If smart watches had an inductive charger you can sit the watch on it, that would be easier but whether people will be happy with a watch that only lasts a day remains to be seen.
I don't think Apple will imagine it like a shrunken down and terrible attempt at a smartphone that straps to your wrist. I think it will be more like an accessory that does things your iPhone cannot do at all or cannot do without the assistance of this accessory. Especially for the fitness crowd, $200 is cheap.
One thing with the fitness idea is that Tim is on the board of Nike which makes the fuelband so they'd end up competing with that. Plus that fitness bracelet lasts a week on battery. As soon as Apple puts a multi-touch display and fast enough CPU/GPU on a watch, the battery life is going to be close to a day - this was the case with the iPod Nano watch and that couldn't even run 3rd party apps.
Having to charge a watch every day isn't really common with watch wearers. Watches are pretty much designed to never need charging.
The Nano or Shuffle are better suited for music while running.
It needs to have a unique selling point. Everything Apple sells has features that can be put up on a poster. I very much doubt that they'd sell a watch as a fitness accessory or even a navigation product, certainly not a music player. I also think the top of the wrist isn't very ergonomic. If this is a device for prolonged use, having the display on the inside of the arm would be far more comfortable but then it loses the aesthetic.
I don't see that being a problem at all. First Apple has turned to Nike for all their fitness tracking needs and I'd bet they'd be willing to continue to do that here. So the section of the iWatch that tracks all your fitness stats is Nike+. Nike charges $169 for a GPS watch and that is actually relatively cheap for what they go for in terms of price. My point is can Apple take what Nike offers, and what others already charge more for and add $30 worth of Apple value to that so that it sells but doesn't try to be a terrible imitation of a smartphone that straps to your wrist. I think they can and should.
Nobody thinks it strange to buy expensive accessories for your computer. Smartphones are now our computers. When people don't sweat a $50 case or $80 extended battery as an accessory, they won't sweat a $200 watch that is a Super Nano/iPhone accessory done right.
NIke+GPS watch $169.
Apple iWatch with GPS, iTunes with wifi sync $199 (Wifi also helps justify price increase from iPod nano)
+Ability to push through certain important notifications from select contacts when exercising via Bluetooth 4.0 if iPhone is near.
+Ability to work with Apple camera app on iPhone and iPad to remotely trigger and stop shooting photos and video (Bye GoPro, you just became the new Flip)
+Several other abilities people above my pay grade are able to conjure.
As for a unique selling point. Simply imagine a skateboarder heading toward the trick he's going to pull. His Apple totting friends in tow. He is a few seconds out and he touches his wrist. Suddenly a cut to his iPhone on a tripod recording his video. The video records his awesome trick.
If Apple were really nuts it could also link to and activate the cameras of any friends who want to point their iPhones, etc at him and then share all the shared shots and video via an iCloud photo/videostream.
Heck could you imagine the unveiling? Tim could invite people to share their keynote video that they shoot and he starts the filming and thus they are all synced in terms of the time started.
Nike charges $169 for a GPS watch and that is actually relatively cheap for what they go for in terms of price. My point is can Apple take what Nike offers, and what others already charge more for and add $30 worth of Apple value to that so that it sells but doesn't try to be a terrible imitation of a smartphone that straps to your wrist. I think they can and should.
In Nike's 10-k for last year, they note $1.2b worldwide revenue for equipment sales:
If that was all $169 watches, it would be around 7.1m units per year or 1.8m per quarter. Their watch has been available since early 2011.
I think it does have an appeal but the appeal is to a very small audience. As I mentioned earlier, Apple sells an Apple TV at 2 million units per quarter and a $200 watch would make more revenue so financially there's enough reason to make one.
I'd expect they'd want maps on it too but there's no cellular data. GPS would just be to track movement data otherwise, which is fine but again limited appeal.
Simply imagine a skateboarder heading toward the trick he's going to pull. His Apple totting friends in tow. He is a few seconds out and he touches his wrist. Suddenly a cut to his iPhone on a tripod recording his video. The video records his awesome trick.
If Apple were really nuts it could also link to and activate the cameras of any friends who want to point their iPhones, etc at him and then share all the shared shots and video via an iCloud photo/videostream.
Heck could you imagine the unveiling? Tim could invite people to share their keynote video that they shoot and he starts the filming and thus they are all synced in terms of the time started.
Why would the person with the watch need to activate the phones when people are holding them? The camera on the tripod would also have to track the user or be far enough away that it can be stolen. The watch also has to be linked with all the phones, it can't just randomly control other people's phones. The usage scenarios outside of fitness are mostly impractical in much the same way Samsung's phone bumping is impractical.
It lists similar revenue figures mentioned previously:
2011 1.2 billion watches sold 35 billion Swiss francs, which they take to be roughly the same in USD Of that amount, $18.8b or 54% of revenue goes to swiss watches despite only making up 31 million watches out of 1.2 billion (this makes the average unit price of the swiss watch around $600) This means the average unit price of the remaining watches is $13. That sounds low but it's broken down here (same stat sources):
That shows that 403m watches come from Hong Kong at an average price of $16 and 682m from China at an average price of $5. I assume those are export prices that will be marked up at retail. Maybe not though, some retail watches are that cheap, even ones with smart features:
"This is a great watch for the cost. Purchased for my son and he really enjoys the watch very much."
No he doesn't Kevin.
"Not super high quality, but a good product for $15. Son wanted it for the calculator and the large size." "We bought this for our godson and he loved it!! It's hard to buy for some people, but he wanted it, you had it, so it was a good gift!" "This is the fourth one of this model that I have owned and they all have been great! The only feature that I miss is a button to control a backlight so I could read it in the dark. The reason for the multiple units is that I live on a lake and sometimes forget I have it on."
There you have lake dwellers inflating the numbers because they are forgetting it's not water-proof. Also grandparents are buying cheap watches for people when they run out of gift ideas, "thanks grandpa, this $13 digital watch designed in 1985 was just what I wanted *drops into drawer beside Android tablet and badly designed ties*, I'll put it on later".
This market certainly looks like the phone market before Apple indisputably came along and changed it forever more. You have decade-old companies that have largely run out of ideas and are repeatedly selling inexpensive junk devices with old designs at the low-end and the ones at the high-end are very expensive and for a select group (sort of the equivalent of Blackberry).
I don't think Apple would have any hope of displacing the high-end swiss watch market but at least that's the lowest proportion of buyers. The bulk of the 1.2b seems to be at the very low-end. Maybe some people will move up from sub-$30 watches to $200 watches like they did with dumbphones. I'd expect some people who buy in that price range already on the likes of this would:
Solar charging like that might help battery performance issues but it depends on how much solar can generate compared to the typical power draw.
I notice a few people are putting wifi in smart watches but I actually think some sort of cellular connection would work better than wifi even if it's just plain old 2G networking. Data doesn't have to be that fast - Apple maps load ok over 2G now that they are vectors. You can't really view images on such a small display so emails and messages would download just text. No browser, no 3rd party apps like the iPod. If they can build an iPod Nano for retail at $149 and Sony's watch is $99, I'd expect they can hit the $99-149 price point too.
OLED can be used here too as there's no need for any media capability. Some sort of Magsafe might be a possibility for charging. Have the side of the watch able to connect magnetically to a plug and use induction to charge so no external charge ports. I wonder if it would need any physical buttons at all. It would be easier to make waterproof that way. You can just tap-hold on the bezel for actions or shake the wrist.
You'd sync the watch to iTunes via a computer or iOS device and that stores the iTunes ID (has to as there's no keyboard). Then it could either sync mail accounts or it can just display any push notifications you get and read-only. Siri would be a must for maps and again why cellular is better than wifi. Cellular might be tricky with no ports unless it had another form of sim like digital but people wouldn't want to pay for data twice.
I don't like the idea of the watch piggy-backing off the phone because if you have a phone with you anyway, I think the appeal of the watch is much less.
TBQH I'll be the first in line. I've been wearing a Nano v.6 watch (LunaTik) for two years, it's super limited, and it's relatively ugly. But it's saved my ass (as a preschool teacher) a few times when my Nano v.7 has unexpectedly run out of battery.
If Apple makes something that can interface with my iPhone, it will change my whole life.
Design-wise the Sony smartwatch looks like the iPod Nano watch:
[VIDEO]
I think that video shows a lot of the flaws with this kind of device. Having to sit with the phone and smartwatch to sync things up like that doesn't look very appealing. They even have a larger 2nd revision coming this month:
[VIDEO]
You can see the charging port on the side there. I think they'd have to come up with a much nicer design than that. The problem is a tiny 1.5" screen is hard to use and a bigger screen would need a big battery and be quite bulky. It needs to be slim, easy to use, it needs to work seamlessly without all that syncing and I think it needs to last at least two days on battery. OLED is quite hard to see in sunlight too.
I have a weird answer for it: yes I think it's worth that price and would pay that. But I'm not interested in this watch, so no. I need sports watches, like the Ambit Suunto I posted about earlier. But Polar, Timex, & Garmin work as well for these purposes. The ?Watch won't suffice here as it doesn't have a GPS chip in it, amongst other limitations.
Darn, how do I get that Apple logo not filled in? A simple trace outline would be better in my opinion.
Comments
One thing with the fitness idea is that Tim is on the board of Nike which makes the fuelband so they'd end up competing with that. Plus that fitness bracelet lasts a week on battery. As soon as Apple puts a multi-touch display and fast enough CPU/GPU on a watch, the battery life is going to be close to a day - this was the case with the iPod Nano watch and that couldn't even run 3rd party apps.
Having to charge a watch every day isn't really common with watch wearers. Watches are pretty much designed to never need charging.
The Nano or Shuffle are better suited for music while running.
It needs to have a unique selling point. Everything Apple sells has features that can be put up on a poster. I very much doubt that they'd sell a watch as a fitness accessory or even a navigation product, certainly not a music player. I also think the top of the wrist isn't very ergonomic. If this is a device for prolonged use, having the display on the inside of the arm would be far more comfortable but then it loses the aesthetic.
There no problem plugging your watch in daily. There was a time people didnt plug a phone in. Now you do. People adapt. You take your watch off at night, plug it in, and put it on in the morning. Done deal.
People always charged phones. Here's an old phone:
http://www.phonearena.com/phones/Nokia-6680_id1107
6 hours talk time. You'd have to charge old phones less frequently, say every 3 days but nobody ever charges watches (you may have noticed the lack of charging ports on them). If smart watches had an inductive charger you can sit the watch on it, that would be easier but whether people will be happy with a watch that only lasts a day remains to be seen.
http://gigaom.com/2013/03/16/why-i-stopped-wearing-my-ipod-nano-as-a-watch/
The iPod watch got some interest but 13,512 people in a month isn't a lot for a company like Apple:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1104350651/tiktok-lunatik-multi-touch-watch-kits
This article here says the Samsung Galaxy Gear watch will have 10 hours of battery life:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/10275662/Galaxy-Gear-will-have-10-hours-battery-life.html
That might not even make it through the day.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
Quote:
Originally Posted by trumptman
I don't think Apple will imagine it like a shrunken down and terrible attempt at a smartphone that straps to your wrist. I think it will be more like an accessory that does things your iPhone cannot do at all or cannot do without the assistance of this accessory. Especially for the fitness crowd, $200 is cheap.
One thing with the fitness idea is that Tim is on the board of Nike which makes the fuelband so they'd end up competing with that. Plus that fitness bracelet lasts a week on battery. As soon as Apple puts a multi-touch display and fast enough CPU/GPU on a watch, the battery life is going to be close to a day - this was the case with the iPod Nano watch and that couldn't even run 3rd party apps.
Having to charge a watch every day isn't really common with watch wearers. Watches are pretty much designed to never need charging.
The Nano or Shuffle are better suited for music while running.
It needs to have a unique selling point. Everything Apple sells has features that can be put up on a poster. I very much doubt that they'd sell a watch as a fitness accessory or even a navigation product, certainly not a music player. I also think the top of the wrist isn't very ergonomic. If this is a device for prolonged use, having the display on the inside of the arm would be far more comfortable but then it loses the aesthetic.
I don't see that being a problem at all. First Apple has turned to Nike for all their fitness tracking needs and I'd bet they'd be willing to continue to do that here. So the section of the iWatch that tracks all your fitness stats is Nike+. Nike charges $169 for a GPS watch and that is actually relatively cheap for what they go for in terms of price. My point is can Apple take what Nike offers, and what others already charge more for and add $30 worth of Apple value to that so that it sells but doesn't try to be a terrible imitation of a smartphone that straps to your wrist. I think they can and should.
Nobody thinks it strange to buy expensive accessories for your computer. Smartphones are now our computers. When people don't sweat a $50 case or $80 extended battery as an accessory, they won't sweat a $200 watch that is a Super Nano/iPhone accessory done right.
NIke+GPS watch $169.
Apple iWatch with GPS, iTunes with wifi sync $199 (Wifi also helps justify price increase from iPod nano)
+Ability to push through certain important notifications from select contacts when exercising via Bluetooth 4.0 if iPhone is near.
+Ability to work with Apple camera app on iPhone and iPad to remotely trigger and stop shooting photos and video (Bye GoPro, you just became the new Flip)
+Several other abilities people above my pay grade are able to conjure.
As for a unique selling point. Simply imagine a skateboarder heading toward the trick he's going to pull. His Apple totting friends in tow. He is a few seconds out and he touches his wrist. Suddenly a cut to his iPhone on a tripod recording his video. The video records his awesome trick.
If Apple were really nuts it could also link to and activate the cameras of any friends who want to point their iPhones, etc at him and then share all the shared shots and video via an iCloud photo/videostream.
Heck could you imagine the unveiling? Tim could invite people to share their keynote video that they shoot and he starts the filming and thus they are all synced in terms of the time started.
In Nike's 10-k for last year, they note $1.2b worldwide revenue for equipment sales:
http://investors.nikeinc.com/files/doc_financials/AnnualReports/2012/docs/nike-2012-form-10K.pdf
If that was all $169 watches, it would be around 7.1m units per year or 1.8m per quarter. Their watch has been available since early 2011.
I think it does have an appeal but the appeal is to a very small audience. As I mentioned earlier, Apple sells an Apple TV at 2 million units per quarter and a $200 watch would make more revenue so financially there's enough reason to make one.
I'd expect they'd want maps on it too but there's no cellular data. GPS would just be to track movement data otherwise, which is fine but again limited appeal.
Why would the person with the watch need to activate the phones when people are holding them? The camera on the tripod would also have to track the user or be far enough away that it can be stolen. The watch also has to be linked with all the phones, it can't just randomly control other people's phones. The usage scenarios outside of fitness are mostly impractical in much the same way Samsung's phone bumping is impractical.
it's a second "monitor" for your iCrap, like the second monitor for your MBA
too lazy to take your iThing out of your pocket / desk drawer / whatever?
just look at your wrist. It's a small bendable wearable touchscreen for your arm (until people start wrapping them around other body parts)
It won't do anything unless / until connected to an iObjeckt you already own, further spurring additional iSales and customer lockin.
When you buy any iOS or OSX product, your geniurd will ask "would you like iWatch with your order" and apple's margin increases accordingly.
Extrapolate, now apple creates wearable computing with lockin, your iUnit a tiny "server" for all your wearable bling iWatchable body junk.
If you allow your iWatch to show iAds you can earn iCash while further polluting the visible landscape of your body (iBod?)
http://www.wthejournal.com/en/pages/swiss-watch-industry-figures
It lists similar revenue figures mentioned previously:
2011
1.2 billion watches sold
35 billion Swiss francs, which they take to be roughly the same in USD
Of that amount, $18.8b or 54% of revenue goes to swiss watches despite only making up 31 million watches out of 1.2 billion (this makes the average unit price of the swiss watch around $600)
This means the average unit price of the remaining watches is $13. That sounds low but it's broken down here (same stat sources):
http://www.economist.com/news/business/21571943-industry-ripe-shake-up-time-money
That shows that 403m watches come from Hong Kong at an average price of $16 and 682m from China at an average price of $5. I assume those are export prices that will be marked up at retail. Maybe not though, some retail watches are that cheap, even ones with smart features:
http://www.amazon.com/Casio-CA53W-Databank-Calculator-Watch/dp/B000GB1R7S
The comments as usual are awesome:
"This is a great watch for the cost. Purchased for my son and he really enjoys the watch very much."
No he doesn't Kevin.
"Not super high quality, but a good product for $15. Son wanted it for the calculator and the large size."
"We bought this for our godson and he loved it!! It's hard to buy for some people, but he wanted it, you had it, so it was a good gift!"
"This is the fourth one of this model that I have owned and they all have been great! The only feature that I miss is a button to control a backlight so I could read it in the dark. The reason for the multiple units is that I live on a lake and sometimes forget I have it on."
There you have lake dwellers inflating the numbers because they are forgetting it's not water-proof. Also grandparents are buying cheap watches for people when they run out of gift ideas, "thanks grandpa, this $13 digital watch designed in 1985 was just what I wanted *drops into drawer beside Android tablet and badly designed ties*, I'll put it on later".
This market certainly looks like the phone market before Apple indisputably came along and changed it forever more. You have decade-old companies that have largely run out of ideas and are repeatedly selling inexpensive junk devices with old designs at the low-end and the ones at the high-end are very expensive and for a select group (sort of the equivalent of Blackberry).
I don't think Apple would have any hope of displacing the high-end swiss watch market but at least that's the lowest proportion of buyers. The bulk of the 1.2b seems to be at the very low-end. Maybe some people will move up from sub-$30 watches to $200 watches like they did with dumbphones. I'd expect some people who buy in that price range already on the likes of this would:
http://www.amazon.com/Casio-PRW2500-1-Pathfinder-Tough-Digital/dp/B005OVCF8U
Solar charging like that might help battery performance issues but it depends on how much solar can generate compared to the typical power draw.
I notice a few people are putting wifi in smart watches but I actually think some sort of cellular connection would work better than wifi even if it's just plain old 2G networking. Data doesn't have to be that fast - Apple maps load ok over 2G now that they are vectors. You can't really view images on such a small display so emails and messages would download just text. No browser, no 3rd party apps like the iPod. If they can build an iPod Nano for retail at $149 and Sony's watch is $99, I'd expect they can hit the $99-149 price point too.
OLED can be used here too as there's no need for any media capability. Some sort of Magsafe might be a possibility for charging. Have the side of the watch able to connect magnetically to a plug and use induction to charge so no external charge ports. I wonder if it would need any physical buttons at all. It would be easier to make waterproof that way. You can just tap-hold on the bezel for actions or shake the wrist.
You'd sync the watch to iTunes via a computer or iOS device and that stores the iTunes ID (has to as there's no keyboard). Then it could either sync mail accounts or it can just display any push notifications you get and read-only. Siri would be a must for maps and again why cellular is better than wifi. Cellular might be tricky with no ports unless it had another form of sim like digital but people wouldn't want to pay for data twice.
I don't like the idea of the watch piggy-backing off the phone because if you have a phone with you anyway, I think the appeal of the watch is much less.
TBQH I'll be the first in line. I've been wearing a Nano v.6 watch (LunaTik) for two years, it's super limited, and it's relatively ugly. But it's saved my ass (as a preschool teacher) a few times when my Nano v.7 has unexpectedly run out of battery.
If Apple makes something that can interface with my iPhone, it will change my whole life.
Or just a watch-sized nano with Bluetooth FFS.
[VIDEO]
I think that video shows a lot of the flaws with this kind of device. Having to sit with the phone and smartwatch to sync things up like that doesn't look very appealing. They even have a larger 2nd revision coming this month:
[VIDEO]
You can see the charging port on the side there. I think they'd have to come up with a much nicer design than that. The problem is a tiny 1.5" screen is hard to use and a bigger screen would need a big battery and be quite bulky. It needs to be slim, easy to use, it needs to work seamlessly without all that syncing and I think it needs to last at least two days on battery. OLED is quite hard to see in sunlight too.
Would you pay $349.00 for this watch ?
I have a weird answer for it: yes I think it's worth that price and would pay that. But I'm not interested in this watch, so no. I need sports watches, like the Ambit Suunto I posted about earlier. But Polar, Timex, & Garmin work as well for these purposes. The ?Watch won't suffice here as it doesn't have a GPS chip in it, amongst other limitations.
Darn, how do I get that Apple logo not filled in? A simple trace outline would be better in my opinion.