Bloomberg.com reports that Swatch plans to bring its answer to the Apple Watch to market in the next 90 days.
“The device will communicate via the Internet “without having to be charged,” Chief Executive Officer Nick Hayek said in an interview. The Swatch smartwatch will also let consumers make mobile payments and work with Windows and Android software, he said.”
The simple solution would be for Apple to buy Swatch and shut it down, or an Apple competitor buy and expand the program or potentially Swatch and other watch makers challenge Apple successfully. I’m really hoping we have tons of competition.
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“…The simple solution would be for Apple to buy Swatch and shut it down, or an Apple competitor buy and expand the program or potentially Swatch and other watch makers challenge Apple successfully….”
Swatch is basically half the watch industry. The parent company of Swatch basically makes the guts of like 80% of the watch industry or something. Even some of the one that claim to make their own watch movements, actually do with with parts or prefab bits from them too.
That’s like 10 billion USD in revenues and 30,000 plus people with real factories.. The type that Apple doesnt like to own or run.
No, Apple’s not buying them. That would tank Apple and it wouldn’t pass EU competition review review either. Swatch itself is already too dominant in that sector without adding in the Apple factor.
Neither can any of the tech companies buy Swatch. Nor should they – the revenue opportunity for them is to try and replicate the “prestige” aspect of a man-jewelry, aka “a watch”, while replacing the guts of it with mass manufactured circuits, not moving analog bits.
But Swatch Group are hunkering down and preparing for war so to speak. They have declared that they are reducing the number of movements they will sell to watch other companies. So basically they are aiming to consolidate the industry, shrink it down and avoid further commodification.
Will be interesting to see how this pans out..
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