According to the Cult of Mac website, when Apple positioned sports and fitness as the main feature of Apple Watch Series 2, the fate of the failure of smart watches is already doomed. Smart watch sales are on the decline, and fitness seems to be the only type of smart watch segment that can be profitable.
More evidence of this trend emerged last week, with media reports that the smart watch pioneer Pebble will be acquired by fitness wearable device maker Fitbit. We may witness the “death†of smart watches.
Is Apple Watch really only suitable for fitness? Will it be a computing platform on the wrist one day?
Apple is centered on fitness
When Apple CEO Tim Cook announced the Apple smartwatch applewatch in 2014, its main goal was to run the app. What features users want to do through Apple Watch, there are applications to help users get what they want. Apple Watch seems to be another iPhone, but it is worn on the user's wrist.
After 2 years, the situation has changed a lot. Now Apple Watch's main goals are fitness, activity tracking and medical care, while other features are "buried" at the bottom of the Apple Watch page.
This is a major change. People can't think of other examples of Apple's radical changes in its use to save a product. After Newton's portable devices struggled in 1997, Steve Jobs, then Apple's chief executive, did not try to find new uses for it, but simply eliminated it. The same is true for the Power Mac G4 Cube computer.
According to the standards of most companies, Apple Watch is not a difficult task. After all, it is also the leader in the smart watch market, accounting for 45.6% of shipments.
But Apple is not the majority of companies. Apple sold 45 million iPhones in the last quarter, but only sold 1.1 million Apple Watches. In other words, only a few iPhone users buy Apple Watch.
For Apple, the data is disappointing, and it's no wonder that it will make new attempts when launching the Apple Watch Series 2. But does the main fitness feature help increase Apple Watch sales?
Non-fitness class wearable device
It’s not just Apple that turns the smart watch’s main function into fitness. For wearable device manufacturers, fitness seems to be the best direction.
Pebble is one of the first manufacturers to introduce smart watch products. It “captured†the hearts and minds of global electronics enthusiasts and launched one of the most successful products on the crowdfunding website Kickstarter. As a Bluetooth device that provides a second screen for smartphones, Pebble is ahead of Apple Watch and Android Wear watches in its release time.
Fitbit plans to acquire Pebble, which means the end of the smart watch pioneer. It is worth noting that the acquisition of Pebble is a wearable device manufacturer: the Pebble smart watch product line will be cancelled, and the Pebble operating system will be adapted for future Fitbit wearable devices.
In other words, similar to Apple Watch, Pebble products will become another fitness device.
The acquisition of Pebble is not the only news of the smart watch industry last week. Motorola said that due to "insufficient market demand," the company has no plans to produce Moto 360 follow-up products.
Smart watches do not really address user needs
According to Cult of Mac, industry insiders believe that the current difficulty for wearable device manufacturers is that current smart watches have no particularly useful features. The goal of smart watches is to save users the hassle of taking out their smartphones from their pockets. Many of the tasks that need to be done on the phone can now be done by simply lifting your wrist.
The problem is that most users have no trouble getting their phones out of their pockets. This is not a big problem that people think is worth buying another expensive electronic device.
Turning the main function to fitness, Apple actually gave up the smart watch (at least for now). In fact, Apple is marketing Apple Watch as a different product. Previously, Apple's competitors in the wearables market were Pebble, Samsung and Motorola, and now its competitors have become Garmin, TomTom and Suunto.
Apple has entered a new market. This is of course no problem, but the number of people who swim and run often is a small number, which cannot be compared with the mass market that Apple products have always faced.
Discover customers "tasks that need to be completed"
In the classic business strategy book Innovator Dilemma, Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen explained that many companies are not able to adapt to disruptive new technologies because they place too much emphasis on short-term profits. Jobs was deeply influenced by Christensen. Some even believe that Jobs has cracked the plight of innovators by focusing Apple on producing great products rather than making huge profits.
However, another theory of Christensen last week became a "media headline." UBS analyst Steven Milunovich told Business Insider that Apple may have “mistaken†because it did not accept Christensen’s “need to complete†(jobs to be done) )theory. According to this theory, companies are usually committed to improving the products already sold, rather than discovering the real needs of customers. This theory is based on the idea that customers have problems and they “interview†multiple products to determine which product can solve the problem.
In the past, Apple has performed extremely well in finding customers “the tasks they need to accomplishâ€. For example, the first iMac's mission is to make it easy for users to surf the Internet. The iPod mission is to put 1000 songs into the user's pocket. The first iPhone's mission is to integrate MP3 players and smartphones so that users only need to carry them with them. equipment.
Milunovic believes that Apple may no longer value the "tasks that need to be completed." As the next device after the iPhone and iPad, Apple Watch is reasonable. However, because Apple wearables do not perform meaningful tasks for any customer, their failure is inevitable.
Timing is important: Apple Watch is premature?
Apple usually waits until it can gain a differentiated competitive advantage before launching a new product. Before the advent of the iPod, there were a lot of MP3 players on the market, but Apple was the first company to configure a portable hard drive for MP3 players, enabling it to store thousands of songs. Similarly, many smartphones have appeared on the market before the advent of the iPhone, but Apple is the first company to configure a touch screen and eliminate physical buttons.
But Apple Watch is different from this, it is a follow-up product, the function is basically the same as Android Wear, the only unique feature is that it only supports iOS, the design is much more beautiful. Apple Watch doesn't have any breakthrough technology that makes it stand out in the market. Most importantly, Apple did not find any important "tasks to complete" for Apple Watch.
So why does Apple continue to keep Apple Watch? Why package it as a sports watch instead of knocking it out like Jobs eliminated Newton?
The industry believes this is because Apple has not given up on smart watches. Fitness is just a strategic short-term behavior, with the goal of waiting for technology that will lead to truly revolutionary wearables.
Smart watches should eliminate the need for pockets
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the watch was born in 1868 and soon became the actual replacement for pocket watches. The Filofax Loose-leaf Notebook was born in 1921 and combines a directory and a diary. The advent of the iPhone in 2007 led to the “unemployment†of individual mobile phones, loose-leaf notebooks and MP3 players. The advent of Apple Pay in 2014 eliminates the need for users to carry credit cards, cash and wallets.
According to Cult of Mac, innovation has been steadily and inevitably reducing and eliminating the need to carry items in pockets or bags.
The first generation of Apple Watch's mission was to reduce the number of times users took out the iPhone from the package, but the real task it should do was to eliminate the need for the user to carry the phone in his pocket, or even further, to eliminate the user's need for pockets.
At present, people's dependence on mobile phones has reached the point where they are inseparable. They are accustomed to keep in touch with other people at any time. It is uncomfortable not to keep in touch with others. As mobile phones get bigger and bigger and more cumbersome, we sometimes don't like to carry mobile phones with them. Most of the time, users prefer a larger display. However, when wearing a particular outfit, such as wearing short-sleeved clothes in the summer, or wearing a formal dress, people don't like to have big mobile phones in their pockets. Even when wearing jeans, it is more comfortable to not have a bulging pocket in your pocket.
When going out, the iPhone is a great alternative to smaller notebooks. There are also many times when people don't need large screens—for example, when drinking outside at night, expensive iPhones may be lost. In these cases, the purpose of carrying a mobile phone is to keep in touch with colleagues, friends, and family members, without the need for an iPhone-like tablet. A small device on your wrist is enough – provided it has a phone connection.
Apple Watch Series 3 with a mobile phone connection will have a completely different experience
Currently Apple Watch is just a companion device for the iPhone, because it does not support mobile phone connections. However, when Apple adds a mobile phone connection to it, Apple Watch will have a very important mission.
If the Apple Watch Series 3 comes with a mobile phone connection, it will eliminate the need for people to carry the iPhone with them. When Apple developed a solution that opened the door with Apple Watch instead of the ordinary key, people no longer needed pockets.
Fitness enthusiasts hope that Apple is serious about sports watches, but others are skeptical. Fitness will always be an important feature of Apple Watch, but it is just one of many features. The industry believes that by positioning the Series 2 as a fitness wearable device, Apple aims to not exit the field, waiting for the release of the Series 3 integrated with mobile phone connection, Series 3 may become Apple's next star.
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