Sony has already introduced a
watch-style companion for its smartphones, but the Samsung model will go
further and be able to make phone calls, surf the web and handle emails on its
tiny screen,Bloomberg claims.
The Galaxy Gear will be unveiled on September 4, at the IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin, the agency claims.
Analysts are divided over whether
smartwatches will provide the industry with a new category of profitable
devices. A survey by analysts IDC found that US consumers were more interested
in wearable technologies such as Google Glass, rather than smartwatches.
But Canalys has predicted that sales
of smartwatches will "explode" from 330,000 units shipped last year
to more than five million in 2014. Analyst Chris Jones claimed they will be
“the most important new product category in consumer electronics since the
iPad”, with crucial opportunites for improvements in health and fitness.
Bloomberg claims the global watch
industry will generate more than $60 billion in sales this year, and the first
companies to sell devices that multitask could lock customers into their
platform, boosting sales of smartphones, tablets and TVs.
Samsung became the world’s largest
smartphone maker last year, overtaking Apple and claiming about 33 percent of
the global smartphone market in the second quarter. The iPhone maker fell to a
three-year low as more consumers chose inexpensive handsets from Chinese
makers.
Samsung released its flagship Galaxy
S4 smartphone in April and plans at least two other high-end handsets this
year, including a device using the Tizen operating system.
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