For Apple, slowing watch sales no big deal

Apple will sell millions of Apple Watch units even as demand slides.

Bloomberg

By  REPORTER: JENNIFERBOOTON

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) | Published: Nov 14, 2014– Despite further evidence of a shrinking watch market, analysts say Apple has nothing to fear ahead of its smart watch launch this spring.

Apple will sell millions of units as expected, they say, even as the market for more traditional accessories (the wearables of yesteryear) continues to decline.

Morningstar consumer analyst Paul Swinand said he “rolls his eyes” at chatter of whether Apple Watch will be impacted by weak mechanical watch sales, or vice versa. Accessories, he said, have been losing steam for years. Watches have been in a decline for at least the last year and a half.

While traditional watch sales are expected to slow by another 3.1% to $63.9 billion globally this year, sales of wearable electronics are forecast to more than quadruple this year to $2.5 billion and rise to $8.5 billion by 2015, according to market researcher Euromonitor.

Shares of Movado Group  tumbled 29% on Friday after it predicted further slowdowns in watch sales and axed its full-year outlook well below expectations. But analysts expect Apple to sell anywhere from 10 million to 50 million or more units in its first year.

“We believe consumers’ appetite for Apple Watch will surprise the skeptics next year,” Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Brian White said in a recent note to clients.The first wave of Apple Watch sales is expected to be comprised largely of early tech adopters and Apple loyalists. But even if fewer-than-expected units are sold, Pacific Crest analyst Andy Hargreaves said it would be less a function of weak demand and more a sign the technology failed to meet lofty expectations.

“If a slowdown in the watch market impacted Apple Watch sales, it would suggest the watch was failing its grander ambition,” he said.

If anything, Apple may have trouble entering such a fragmented market, Swinand said. There are dozens of smart bands on the market already, including Galaxy Gear, which is manufactured by Apple adversary Samsung Electronics. Several of them have flopped.

Of course, some of the slowdown in the traditional watch market might because some people are holding off for the Apple Watch and other similar smart bands.

But Bulova Corp. president Gregory Thumm in a recent email to MarketWatch was sure to distinguish between the two.

“Wearing a wrist watch is much less about timekeeping, than it is a cultural phenomenon,” he said. “It is like a neck tie or a handbag.”

Moto 360 smartwatch on sale now

for $250, metal bands coming this fall

Motorola's long-awaited smartwatch is finally ready to be released, at least in the US. After roughly five months since being unveiled, the Moto 360 is due to hit the consumer market at last, one that's been so patiently awaiting its arrival. Starting today at noon ET, those of you in the States can order your very own for $250, from Motorola's website, Google Play and Best Buy (both online and at retail stores). That's not it, though, since Motorola also revealed that its circular Android Wear watch in metallic flavors will be coming later this fall -- although those sleeker silver and black options are set to be priced for $50 more than its leather counterparts. That said, Motorola does want early adopters to feel blanketed, so it's making the metal, swappable bands available separately for $80 a piece. Across other parts of the world, meanwhile, the Moto 360 smartwatch is going to hit the UK in "early October" for £199, and Canada in the fall for $279. Your move, LG.

original post here >>

Apple: Your Data Is Safe With Us, China

People wait outside an Apple store all night prior to the mainland release of iPhone 4S on January 12, 2012 in Beijing, China.   ChinaFotoPress—Getty Images

Apple insisted Saturday that it does not pass on data collected from Chinese iPhone users to U.S. intelligence services

Apple on Saturday denied claims made on Chinese state media that its iPhone presents a security risk to customers by compromising location data.

“Apple does not track users’ locations – Apple has never done so and has no plans to ever do so,” Apple said on Saturday, the Financial Times reports.

A Friday report on CCTV, the widely influential Chinese state-owned broadcaster, warned that the iPhone could track users using its positioning technology, and “view the user’s home address, unit information and whereabouts.” The report also claimed that information could be passed to U.S. intelligence services.

In an explanation published on its homepage in China, Apple said it has “never worked with any government agency from any country to create a backdoor in any of our products or services,” the Financial Times reports.

Apple also said that users location services can only be accessed by the device’s owner when they enter their passcode

original here >>

Why Detroit is terrified of google's self driving cars!

Google’s latest self-driving car prototype doesn’t 

even have a steering wheel.

Image courtesy of Google

Detroit's Dilemma : The American automotive industry isn’t as resistant to innovation as it once was. But Detroit’s big three automakers have their cost structures to deal with, their reputations to think about, and (lately) their profits to protect. So anything too risky is going to be a hard sell.

It doesn’t get much more risky than a technology that would turn cars into robots and end driving as we know it.

It’s no wonder, then, that Google and Detroit haven’t found much common ground in their early discussions about self-driving car collaborations, as Reuters’ Alexei Oreskovich and Ben Klayman reported Monday:

In one meeting, both sides were enthusiastic about the futuristic technology, yet it soon became clear that they would not be working together. The Internet search company and the automaker disagreed on almost every point, from car capabilities and time needed to get it to market to extent of collaboration. It was as if the two were “talking a different language,” recalls one person who was present.

14 Google Glass Innovative Uses In Education

Google Glass is finding its way into almost every industry, with applications in healthcare, construction, gaming, tourism, and law enforcement. Gartner believes that smartglasses will save the field service industry $1 billion per year. One domain that is especially ripe for Google Glass innovation is education. I spoke with Brian A. Rellinger, CIO Ohio Wesleyan University about the ways Glass can be used on campus. The OWU Information Services Department purchased Google Glass in March, 2014 and started brainstorming about ways to use it with a cross section of campus groups. Since Glass is a new technology, the ideas continue to multiply as individuals gain hands-on experience. Even so, the faculty, staff, and students at OWU came up with a diverse list of initial ideas.

Brian Rellinger, CIO Ohio Wesleyan University

Based on the OWU list, here are 14 ways that Google Glass can improve higher education. Each idea may not be a fit for every campus, but hopefully it can help start the discussion for new or potential Glass owners. Do you have more ideas? Feel free to tweet them to us at @ValaAfshar and @rellinb.

1. 1. Incorporate Glass into college athletics. Football, baseball, basketball players, for example, can wear Glass during practice. The coach can give them realtime instructions. Players can view recordings to understand their head and body movements. Also, spectators can join the hangout to experience the sport from the player's first person perspective. Tennis and football QB examples.
2. 2. Ask alumni or others to wear Glass during performances in the arts and other intense professional activities, so students can experience the performance and participate remotely. See video with chef Roy Choi.
3. 3. Give students realtime interactive (and subsequently recorded) field trip experiences to difficult-to-reach places like the Large Hadron Collider (CERN); the Oval Office; a war zone; Federal Reserve Bank; Mt. Everest; Tibet, Papua, New Guinea; Cheyenne Mountain; Antarctica; Egyptian pyramids.

Apple To Make Medical Devices?

Written by: Zach Walton |  Feb 19 

Apple is one of the biggest companies in the world thanks to its mobile devices. The iPhone and iPad have proven to be big sellers quarter after quarter, but the gravy train can’t last forever. Apple has to be constantly looking for the next big thing, and it may have found it.

The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that Apple applied for a patent that would allow users to unlock phones based upon the unique electrical signals from their heart. Apple may be looking into this method as a more reliable biometric identifier. After all, the fingerprint reader on the iPhone 5S was hacked within a day of release.

While the technology may first appear in smartphones, the report states that Apple has much grander ambitions for it. The company may be using this technology to measure “noise turbulence as it applies to blood flow” to predict heart attacks. The technology, reportedly being worked on by THX creator Tomlinson Holman, could very well come to consumer mobile devices allowing consumers to easily track their own blood flow and detect problems without having to see a doctor first.

While medical devices would be a pretty big departure from Apple’s normal operations, cars would be an even bigger departure. Despite that, the report also states that Apple may be looking into acquiring Tesla Motors – the electric car manufacturer founded by Elon Musk. The acquisition would give Apple an outlet into a quickly growing segment of the automobile market and help the company better compete with Google’s own Open Automative Alliance.

While all of this certainly sounds interesting, none of it has been even remotely confirmed by Apple. This is all based solely upon conjecture and meetings Apple has had with various persons and governmental organizations over the past few months. Even so, Apple will need to find something to bring in money as the mobile device market matures in developed markets. Cars and medical devices may be just the thing. Just don’t expect to hear anything about it for at least a few more year

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Toshiba Encore tablet meets the future of tech

Published on 8 Feb 2014 | At a London event Toshiba and production company Inition showed off how the Encore tablet can combine with emerging technologies. Report by Laurie Blake.

The Russian Android-Powered, Dual-Screen YotaPhone Launched

Published on 4 Dec 2013 | YotaPhone Unboxing - We unbox the new YotaPhone. The dual-display smartphone will be available before Christmas in Germany. The YotaPhone has a dual-core SoC from Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 with 1.7 GHz, 2GB RAM, 32GB memory.





a Read up : The Android-Powered, Dual-Screen YotaPhone Launches In Russia And Beyond For €499