Smart watches and bracelets are the latest techno phenomenon and everyone is trying to catch its piece of the pie but it seems nobody knows exactly - what the pie should look like.
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Smart watches are the next big thing, no doubt about it, as the high-tech industry is shifting toward wearable devices in order to bring the technology literally closer to the customers and to make a new profit in markets already saturated with mobile devices. A recent survey conducted in the United Kingdom and the United States shows that smart watch users find it boring and confusing. And if users from markets accustomed to high-tech devices think smart watches are confusing, that means the industry needs a new paradigm.
While analyzing smart watches, the first impression is that all manufactures are very concerned about their customers' health, it seems that a sleep analyzer is a function that simply must not be ignored. A step counter is another one and, with health apps, it seems that smart watches have "fit and healthy" customers as their main target, no matter is it about a digital fitness bracelet or a device that looks more serious.
All wearable devices are in their first generation but some trends are obvious. The reason for that is simple: Fitness sensors are available and software for them is easy to write. Manufacturers' health concerns stop here.
Martian Watches Passport is a hybrid device: An analog quartz watch with some electronics added. It allows users to see incoming calls and messages, make calls through the watch's speaker and microphone, and do anything a smartphone can execute with a voice command. It shows text messages, emails and social notifications in the line below the classic watch. A user is using voice command to create calendar events, check weather and directions, set an alarm and search the web hands-free.
If you are not a character from a James Bond movie, we doubt you will be happy walking around all day long talking to your wrist. Martian Watches Passport is more of a device that resembles a toy than a full-fledged smart watch.
Huawei is another big company that wants a piece of a smart watch pie but can't decide should it make a watch or a bracelet. TalkBand B1 features a 1.4-inch flexible OLED display on the band and has a removable earpiece inside it, which you should pull out to make a call. It also has a feature popular among manufacturers, a pedometer, and it records how far you've traveled and how many calories you've burned. And it has a sleeping pattern monitor and alarm that should wake you up "at the optimal time".
TalkBand B1 is a fully digital device but it also has an identity problem. To be a fitness device it needs more functions, and to be a watch... Well, it is not a watch, it is too thick, and the look is certainly suitable for only a small group of users.
Samsung Galaxy Gear was developed following two guidelines: To be a stylish wearable device and to connect to a Samsung smartphone. With the Galaxy Gear the user can control the phone, make calls, see messages... The user can make calls talking to the wrist. When the user gets a notification on the Gear, the message will be shown by picking up the phone. It has a pedometer, a few simple apps like timer and weather, and it can play movies (an interesting experience on such a small display, indeed).
Galaxy Gear is closest to a smart watch but it simply lacks more functions, longer battery life, and its design is... decent. Just decent. We would expect to see more from Samsung.
Those are just a few examples of devices currently available but they clearly show the state of the industry today.
This first generation of smart watches certainly has it public but they are limited to geek-like users who are fascinated with every new high-tech device, regardless of functionality. With technologies available today it is possible to make a good-looking standalone smart watch suitable for broad audience, a device that it is not just an extension of a mobile phone.
Today's smart watches obviously have identity crisis but there are companies that could make them much better. By that we firstly think on Samsung, LG, and Sony. It will be very interesting to follow this industry and see what other big players (with Apple's iWatch as the most anticipated device of them all) will bring to the market this year. ■
