Rising From The Ashes
Will 2015 prove to be the defining year for
the much-touted wearable tech market?
THE SMARTWEAR market came riding a tsunami of hype. Five years
ago, the prediction was that everyone will own more than two wearable devices
in two years. All the ‘with-it’ people were already wearing fitness bands, all
the cool kids had tried out virtual reality headsets, the geeks and nerds swore
by Google Glass and smartwatches were all set to outsell smartphones. Whoosh
forward to today and the wearable tech market is a disaster. No momentum. Most
fitness bands have been taken off wrists, smartwatches are a dead category and
most people who bought a Google Glass can’t remember which cupboard it’s lying
discarded in.
But in 2015, wearable tech may just see a phoenix-like rise from
the ashes. It may even outgun all previous predictions. Sample these estimations:
150 million wearable devices will be bought every year by 2019, smartwatches
will dominate 60 per cent of this sale, 100 million active smartwatches will be
on people’s wrists in the next three years and the wearable tech market will be
worth about $55 billion by then. Many analysts have come up with theories for
this. I’m going to give you some of those, contradict a few that seem to be
pure hyperbole and then add a few reasons of my own.
The Apple Watch Kicks
Off
No, it’s not that the Apple Watch will sell in those numbers.
But it might kick-start the sale to reignite this market. It’s estimated that
2.5 million Apple Watches were pre-ordered in the first week. While the Watch
itself isn’t ground breaking or perfect, it has two things going for it. The
first, an army of Apple fans that blindly pick up anything Apple; the second,
it’s a seamless extension of its ecosystem. Put them together and you’re going
to see a serious number of people buy an Apple Watch. Right after, you’re going
to see a serious number of other manufacturers come up with watches that do
everything that the Apple Watch does, and then beat it. The iPhone story will
play out all over again. My prediction is that by 2019 Apple will have about 20
per cent of the market, Google will have about the same and a third player will
take the lion’s share. I hope you’re reading this Pebble, TAG Heuer and Timex,
and I hope one of you is ready to get serious and come out swinging.
Brace Up For HoloLens,
Gear and Oculus
If you haven’t heard about Microsoft HoloLens, Samsung Gear VR
and Oculus Rift, it’s time for you to check your pulse and see if you’re still
alive. These are the start to the greatest revolution in virtual and augmented
reality. By 2018, these will shrink in size to near nothing, will dominate the
gaming world and make monitors and TVs obsolete. You’ll use these as a video
conferencing system and communication devices, and also as your go-to displays
for everything you do. Think of every sci-fi movie that made your imagination
go wild about the future. These display devices will beat the pants of all of
those.
GOQii Forays New
Terrain
Juniper Research are technology market research specialists. Top
companies across the world rely on them to predict the future. When they
predict something, it’s likely to happen. And in their new report, they’ve
listed our very own GOQii fitness as one of the top five reasons for the
wearable tech market to explode. Their reason is fairly simple. Fitness bands
need to have a second-level trick apart from quantifying data about your body.
That data needs to link to a service that actually helps you make changes. They
cite GOQii’s fitness band and its unique ability to link a user with their own
“real” personal coach to keep them motivated towards achieving their goals. In
the future, a wearable device needs to distinguish between an app that syncs
data versus a service that uses that data. GOQii’s amazing success in the US,
India and Middle East markets seems to be a testament to that fact.
Of Payment Systems And
Wearable Tech
Imagine never carrying a wallet, never withdrawing cash from an
ATM and never swiping a credit card ever again. The prediction is that
wearables will become your secure payment system. Touch your smartwatch to the
machine at the mall, hold out your band while getting into the Metro, and buy a
movie ticket by swiping the kiosk with your bracelet. Each of these will have
the technology for you to load money on to them and use it where you like. The ease
of this system will make every one of us go out and put on at least one
wearable device on our body. I’m going to close by giving you an offer. The
next huge start-up, the next billionaire, the next household name, will come
from the wearable market. If you’re in school or college, if you’re thinking of
a start-up, if you think you want homes all over the world and if an Aston
Martin DB9 car is your model of choice to commute to your office, then start
racking your brains as to how you can get into the wearables markets.
There’s $55 billion waiting for someone to paw it. Just make
sure you send me my standard one per cent as ‘idea-starter’ fee.
·
Rajiv
Makhni HBR
10MAY15
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