The battle for the prized piece of real estate on your forearm is heating up with Apple’s high profile unveiling of the Apple Watch this week. Samsung got a head start when it debuted the Galaxy Gear line last year. Ironically, the company that got into the wearables first, Sony, is struggling for its share of this promising market.
Way back in 2010, Sony’s LiveView watch failed to make any kind of splash. Sony hopes that its latest line of wearables – SmartBand Talk and SmartWatch 3 – unveiled last week in Germany, will fare better.
Hirohito Kondo, a product planning manager at the company's mobile division in Tokyo, says the brand appeal rests in three key areas: design, intuitive functionality, and, most importantly, Lifelog, the company's flagship app for tracking and documenting every "motional and emotional" aspect of your life.
"It's not just about recording where you went or what you did. We want to bring all the precious experiences of your daily life to you in an enjoyable way," said Kondo.
There’s a lot of competition out there, ranging from Apple Watch's 18-karat gold case to Motorola 360's circular design. And the verdict is still out on the likely winner. Sony’s approach is to focus on the human experience. With features like hands-free control through advanced voice recognition technology, Sony hopes users will forge a deeper connection with its wearable devices.
But Sony may find it difficult to build global appeal for its smart watch because it doesn’t have the flash that Apple's new timepiece has. And while the SmartBand's design is sleek and the Lifelog software spot on, we're not convinced that people want to track exactly where they jogged last Tuesday or what song they were listening to at the time.
Sony currently ranks fifth in terms of smart watch sales, with 250,000 units shipped and $50 million revenue generated in 2013, according to Smartwatch Group, a research firm. It estimates total market size of smart watches will be $2.5 billion in 2014.
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