As Samsung gears up to announce its Galaxy Gear smartwatch, a new report claims Apple's iWatch will debut in 2014 with a $199 price tag, and a projected 63.4 million sold in its first year.
It's no secret that Samsung will beat Apple to market by launching its first smartwatch, the Galaxy Gear. The company has already confirmed that it will announce the watch at its Unpacked event on September 4, alongside the Galaxy Note 3. Samsung and many analysts are delighted that the company will bring a smartwatch to market before Apple does, but most people forget that Apple has never been the first to the party with its most successful devices. What it has repeatedly done is enter a market that others have tried to dominate and during that time Apple usually figures out how to make their offering stand out by being user friendly and nailing what its rivals missed.
Years before Apple ever introduced the first iPod, there were already many MP3 players on the market, so the company was able to see how other companies got it wrong and when it decided to launch the iPod it knew it got it right. The iPod quickly became the best selling MP3 player on the market and that single device turned Apple into an icon. When it launched the iPhone, it entered the crowded smartphone market; again it was not the first on the scene, but it managed to provide a user experience no other company dreamt of offering. When Steve Jobs unveiled the original iPhone he announced that Apple had a goal of selling 10 million of the handsets in its first year. The company now sells close to three times that amount in a single quarter.
The iPad wasn't the first tablet either; Microsoft tried its hand at the tablet world for years before Apple ever considered entering the game. Again, coming late to the party allowed the company to get it right on the first try. The same is probably true with the iWatch. Apple won't be the first to release a smartwatch, but you can bet it will learn from all previous smartwatches, including Samsung's Galaxy Gear. A new report claims that Apple has already given contracts to two manufacturers to build its smartwatch, revealing its price and expected shipments.
"Apple is likely to introduce 'iWatch' in 2014. From our channel checks, Inventec is the major assembly source for 'iWatch', with about 60 per cent of order allocation," said CIMB Securities analyst Wanli Wang, as cited in the report.
"CIMB projects 63.4 million units of 'iWatch' shipments in the year after its launch with an average price of around $199, while the 'iWatch' project is estimated to contribute 19 per cent of Inventec's earnings in 2014, Wang said," adds the report.
Judging by the past, while Apple will be late to the party once again, being fashionably late has somehow always worked in the company's favor.
