Wearable tech, we’re told, is the next big thing – and if anyone can make a truly desirable wearable device, it’s Apple.
Rumours are flying about an Apple Watch, the missing link between the iPhone and Flavor Flav’s clock. CEO Tim Cook even hinted at the iWatch during an investors’ meeting in February 2013. Well, he told investors that “obviously we’re looking at new categories” of development
Apple has a team of around 100 designers working on “a wristwatch-like device that may perform some of the tasks now handled by the iPhone and iPad”. That’s based on conversations with “two people familiar with the company’s plans”.
The team includes people from all parts of Apple, this people not just iPad and iPhone engineers but software developers, managers and marketers’ too. Currently, the retail price and the iWatch release date is unknown.
Clearly, though, until we have a better idea of what the Apple Watch is and whether Apple is actually going to ship it, nobody has the faintest idea what it’ll cost either in America, China or when it is shipped to Nigeria.
As for a release date, we’re a little more clued-in. Some of tech sources have opined that we’ll see it launch in 2013 for sure, although we’d prescribe the requisite amount of salt to go alongside that rumour.
Another sure specification is that Apple is experimenting with wristwatch-like devices made of curved glass, The glass can curve around the human body and may be Corning’s just-announced Willow Glass, which “can flop as easily as a piece of paper in the wind without breaking.”
Adding credence to this particular supposition is the fact that Apple has patented a ’90s slap-band style form factor which would require such a flexible display. Apple’s patented plenty of tech that never sees the literal light of day – we can’t help but hope this isn’t one of those.
The iWatch has Bluetooth and a 1.5-inch display, Bluetooth is essential, though if the iWatch is going to communicate with your phone or iPod, low energy Bluetooth is the way to do it.
A 1.5-inch screen suggests it’ll show selected information from your iOS device rather than mirror the whole display, which would be rubbish.
What most tech fanatics what to know is “Would it include Siri, the voice assistant? Would it have a version of Apple’s map software, offering real-time directions to people walking down the street? Could it receive text messages? Could it monitor a user’s health or daily activity?”
Some of these questions have since been reported as fact by more excitable outlets, but the idea of having Siri makes sense, not least because you could pretend to be a sci-fi secret agent.
If Siri is on board, it may be because the iWatch is running a form of actual iOS rather than a souped-up iPod nano software system – thus supposes Bloomberg again, with ‘confirmation’ provided by The Verge’s inside sources.
What is interesting is that the wearable watch market could be the next big tech battleground as perennial Apple nemesis Samsung has already confirmed that it has a smart watch in the works.
Other tech heavyweights are rumoured to be getting in on the timekeeping game too; the Apple watch may have to fight off competition from Google, which filed a smart watch patent last year and was ‘confirmed’ to be working on a timepiece by the good folk over at the Financial Times.
Also leaping aboard the largely-imaginary bandwagon is LG. Despite launching a disappointing phone-watch thing back in 2009, LG isn’t being deterred and finally has an Apple watch baiting rumour of its own thanks to the Korea Times.
He makes a good point about the iWatch release date too: “Apple, when you look back, is never actually the first. They let a few others, sometimes many others, experiment first. (Tablets were out for more than a decade.) Then, they bring out the killer product.”
Depending on the features and eventual portability of the device, we expect to see a sink or swim device, it is most certain that with the giant leaps being taken in the Technology world, the next few years would be categorised with witty, efficient and fashionable gadgets
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