Hybrid Designs to Account for Most of Smartwatch Market by 2022, Says Juniper
Hybrid smartwatches, such as Fossil Q and Nokia Steel, will comprise more than half of the smartwatch market in 2022, said a Tuesday Juniper Research report. Nearly 80 million hybrid smartwatches will ship by 2022, up 460 percent from 14…
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million last year, and digital display smartwatches such as the Apple Watch and Fitbit Ionic, are projected to jump by 160 percent. Slowing growth for digital display smartwatches has driven manufacturers including Motorola, Huawei and Sony to leave the space, Juniper said. Remaining smartwatch makers are pivoting toward specific use cases, which is having an impact on design and distribution through specialized retailers, said analyst James Moar. Despite interest in hybrids, Juniper expects individual players to ship fewer than 2 million devices annually. An exception is Fossil, which has blanketed the market with display and hybrid smartwatches throughout its brands, and is forecast to ship over 6 million smartwatches annually by 2020, Juniper said. The report also said different connectivity technologies are becoming more prevalent in smartwatches, with GPS expected to be present in nearly half of all smartwatches by 2022. Penetration of near-field communications will be minor because NFC devices are "locked into specific ecosystems."