Wearables are a growth opportunity for the flat SIM (subscriber identity module) card market, an IHS report said Wednesday. The number of SIM cards shipped globally is forecast to increase from 5.4 billion in 2015 to 5.6 billion in 2020, IHS said, citing smartwatches, fitness bands, smart glasses and clothes as possible growth drivers for smart-card suppliers and mobile network operators. “The rising number of these devices in the market is an opportunity for operators and card suppliers to increase SIM penetration for both pluggable and embedded form factors,” IHS analyst Don Tait said. SIM-enabled wearables have the potential to increase mobile network operator (MNO) subscribers, leading to more addressable devices for SIM management and increased revenue streams, Tait said. Companion devices are expected to spur growth in the SIM card market from 2015 to 2020, IHS said. Embedded SIM cards (eSIMs) will begin to appear in smartphones in the next couple of years as part of dual-mode SIM designs that also include a removable SIM card for backward compatibility, Tait said. Including an eSIM and a removable SIM card in a smartphone is a way for companies to test the market, similar to the strategy OEMs adopted for the advent of mobile payments, Tait said.
Health tech company MC10 partnered with PCH, a custom products company, to commercialize MC10’s Wearable Interactive Stamp Platform (WiSP) that lives on a tattoo-like wearable the size of a postage stamp. When paired with a smartphone, the WiSP platform enables consumer applications including cashless payments, hotel room access, event registration and interactive experiences at amusement parks, sports and music events, said the companies. The smart stamp was first commercialized with beauty company L’Oréal as the first “stretchable electronic” measuring an individual’s exposure to ultraviolet rays. The stamp uses near-field communication technology to enable interactions between the wearer and a brand, said the companies. By combining cloud analytics with the WiSP platform, brands can “deepen their understanding of consumer behavior,” the companies said. As a security measure to protect user data, the breathable, waterproof stamp is “unreadable upon removal,” they said.
Fitbit sold more than a million Blaze devices in the first month they were available, said the company Thursday. Fitbit Blaze ($199) was the No. 1 selling device in the smartwatch and heart monitor categories at Amazon, Fitbit said. The first Blaze review at Amazon, Feb. 25, gave the device a five-star rating, and it has held an average four-star review out of a total 1,230 at Amazon. The Fitbit Alta fitness tracker ($129), by contrast, sold more than a million units since it began shipping March 9 and had an average four-star rating from 689 reviewers on Thursday, said Fitbit.
Amazon pinged Echo owners in an email Friday promoting integration with Fitbit trackers and smart scales. Pushing Echo owners to “stay motivated on your fitness journey,” Amazon instructed users to enable the Fitbit skill in the Alexa app so they can ask questions about the number of steps they've taken, how they slept last night or overall questions about exercise.
Western European consumers will buy 24.5 million connected fitness trackers and 20.8 million smartwatches in 2020, Parks Associates said in a Tuesday report. “The expansion of mobile device platforms to wearable form factors creates many opportunities for developers to build new services and applications,” it said. “For the smart watch, its location on the body and easy access put it in a great position to act as a remote control for smart home features, a role currently occupied by the smartphone.” Parks estimates that 10 percent of broadband homes in Spain own a smartwatch, followed by 8 percent in the U.K., 7 percent in Germany and 6 percent in France. In the U.S., a third of broadband homes own a digital health and wellness device, and 10 percent plan to buy a smartwatch by midyear 2016, the researcher said.
Consumers who are tech-savvy, highly social and extremely style-conscious will lead the next wave of wearables adoption in the U.S., but they haven’t yet bought into the technology, said an IDC report Tuesday. Consumers who intend to buy wearables “are enthusiastic about wearables but have hesitated to actually purchase a device,” said analyst Allan Fromen, and that implies “companies have not yet cracked the code to deliver something that is both functional and fashionable.” Companies need to focus on aesthetics, “perhaps even more so than the features,” Fromen said. Of consumers who intend to buy wearables in the next six months, 89 percent are comfortable with technology, 76 percent check their smartphone first thing in the morning and 87 percent use Facebook, with 29 percent checking Facebook hourly, said IDC. On the style front, 81 percent were conscious of how they present themselves, 77 percent said how they dress is important to them, 66 percent said clothing is an expression of who they are and 63 percent said accessories such as jewelry and watches “say something about me.” Wearable intenders' preferred brands differ by category. Most preferred brands are Apple (52 percent) for smartwatches, Fitbit (37 percent) for fitness trackers, Google (36 percent) for eyewear and Nike (40 percent) for clothing, it said. The wearables market is still in “early stages,” which gives companies in the ecosystem “opportunity to grab mind share and market share," said IDC analyst Ramon Llamas. "Intenders are gravitating towards tech companies for wearables because tech companies have helped pioneer and move the market forward,” said Llamas, who will watch “how tech companies partner with non-tech companies to develop new applications, or even how non-tech companies can compete in this space.” IDC's wearables intender data is based on 1,500 surveys among U.S. consumers who intend to buy a wearables product in the next six months.
Global wearable device suppliers shipped a total of 78.1 million units in 2015, a strong 172 percent increase over 2014, IDC said in a Tuesday report. “Triple-digit growth highlights growing interest in the wearables market from both end-users and vendors," IDC said. "It shows that wearables are not just for the technophiles and early adopters” but also have mass-market potential, it said. “Since wearables have yet to fully penetrate the mass market, there is still plenty of room for growth in multiple vectors,” including new vendors, form factors, applications and use cases, it said. “This will help propel the market further.” Fitbit, which Monday reported a 92 percent increase in its holiday-quarter sales (see 1602230049), ended 2015 “the same way it began the year: as the undisputed worldwide leader of wearable devices,” IDC said. Fitbit’s shipments climbed 93.2 percent in 2015 to 21 million units, enough to solidify its market leadership position with a 26.9 percent share, IDC said. Apple, which began shipping the Apple Watch last April, shipped 11.6 million such devices for the year, placing it as the world’s No. 3 wearables supplier with a 14.9 percent share, it said. China's Xiaomi shipped 12 million units in 2015, making it the world's No. 2 supplier with a 15.4 percent share.
Garmin announced a smartwatch and an activity tracker Friday ahead of this week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The $249 vívoactive HR smartwatch counts steps, floors climbed, intensity minutes and monitors sleep, said Garmin. It has built-in GPS-enabled apps for walking, running, biking, swimming, golfing, paddle boarding, rowing, skiing and snowboarding, the company said. The vívoactive HR uses wrist-based heart rate data to calculate calories burned and the intensity of fitness activities. It also packs Garmin’s Move IQ technology that continuously monitors for periods of sustained activity and automatically recognizes walking, running, biking, swimming and elliptical training. Battery life is given as eight days in watch/activity tracking mode. Garmin's vívofit 3 activity tracker, meanwhile, has a one-year battery life and the Move IQ technology. The tracker’s backlit display shows steps, calories, distance, intensity minutes and time of day, said the company. The tracker is water resistant to 50 meters and has an interchangeable band. Price is $99 or $109 depending on band, Garmin said. On an earnings call last week, Garmin CEO Cliff Pemble said the company is targeting 10 percent revenue growth in the fitness segment in 2016 -- split among trackers and cycling and running devices -- with new products playing a “key role” in growth projections. Garmin’s Q4 revenue slipped 3 percent year over year to $781 million on currency rate changes and ongoing declines in the personal navigation device (PND) market, said Pemble. The company expanded its PND position with Honda and is now in the Pilot, Accord, Civic and CRV models, and Garmin navigation is now in Mercedes-Benz C and E class vehicles, Pemble said. But category declines are expected to be 15 percent this year on continued declines in the PND segment, he said. For the year, Garmin’s non-auto segments were 62 percent of total revenue, compared with 57 percent last year, he said. Garmin believes it's the market-share leader in the GPS-enabled wearables category with low- to mid-40 percent share, said Pemble. The wearables category expanded “significantly” in the past year but is still in growth mode, he said. Garmin expects to take additional share “and reclaim some share” this year on a stronger product lineup.
Qualcomm announced new Snapdragon processors Thursday for the wearables and smartphone markets. The Snapdragon Wear platform and Wear 2100 SoC, available now, are part of a new product family targeted to wearables in the mobile, fashion and sports spaces, said the company. LG and Qualcomm, which have collaborated on smartwatches based on Android Wear, will continue their relationship via the Wear 2100 processor, said LG Vice President-Wearables David Yoon, saying new LG smartwatches and “other wearable devices” will launch later this year. The Snapdragon Wear platform comprises silicon, software, support tools and reference designs available in tethered (Bluetooth and Wi-Fi) and connected (4G/LTE and 3G) versions, said Qualcomm. It said benefits of the platform over previous designs include: a 30 percent smaller size; 25 percent lower power requirement; smarter, more accurate algorithms; and an always-on connected experience. Customers can develop tethered and connected SKUs using the same circuit board design to cut development costs, Qualcomm said. Snapdragon Wear 2100 supports Android Wear, and Android and is targeted for connected and tethered smartwatches, watches for the kid and elderly segments, smart bands, and smart eyewear and smart headsets, Qualcomm said. The company also announced three upcoming Snapdragon processors for mid- and high-end smartphones. The Snapdragon 625, 435 and 425 processors incorporate support for LTE with carrier aggregation; Snapdragon All Mode; 802.11ac with MU-MIMO; dual camera image signal processors; TruSignal technology for improved call reliability; a Hexagon DSP for power-efficient audio with sensor hub to meet Android M sensor requirements; and Quick Charge, said Qualcomm. The processors will deliver “premium-tier” smartphone user experiences using custom-developed camera, video, gaming and connectivity technologies, Qualcomm said. The top-tier 625 octa-core processor is Qualcomm’s first to use 14-nanometer FinFET technology, said to yield up to 35 percent power savings versus the previous processor generation. Other features: 4K HEVC recording and playback in low light, dual high-resolution cameras, 24-megapixel photos and up to 13-megapixel selfies; and advanced post-processing features such as re-focus, advanced editing and special effects, Qualcomm said. Qualcomm expects to sample the processors mid-year for smartphone market arrival in the second half.
Fitbit began presales Wednesday for the Alta, which it dubs its “most fashionable device yet.” The fitness device has a wristband with a satin finish, stainless steel body, interchangeable bands and a watch face. The Alta tracks activity, exercise and sleep and includes “reminders to move” to keep users active, said the company. The OLED display can be set to portrait or landscape orientation and users can choose from clock face options. The Bluetooth device notifies users of calls, texts and calendar events from a nearby smartphone through on-screen messages or a vibrating alert. Battery life is given as five days. Alta is Android, iOS and Windows-compatible, said Fitbit. The $129 device will begin shipping next month.