Apple will reportedly launch its smartwatch as early as October, after kicking off production in July, according to a new report from Reuters. The smartwatch will have a 2.5-inch screen, according to the news organization’s sources, which will arch up from the band and be “slightly rectangular,” and it’ll feature touchscreen controls and wireless charging.
Apple is planning on shipping 50 million of these in the first year of its availability, Reuters adds, and Taiwan’s Quanta computers will be mass producing the device for the Cupertino-based iPhone-maker. It’s currently under trial production, the company’s sources add, and it contains a pulse sensor (likely an optical one similar to that found on the Gear 2), plus a display supplied by LG for this first test batch.
The report is yet another claim by a reliable news organization that says we’ll see Apple’s foray into smartwatches launch in October. A report from Japanese business newspaper Nikkei earlier this month said that Apple would launch the device in October, too, and also claimed it would pack a curved OLED display (which could account for the arcing described in this product) and health-tracking capabilities.
Generally speaking, once Apple ramps up its production on new large-scale runs of upcoming products, the details begin to leak to major news organizations through suppliers in rapid succession. There are always a flood of these kinds of reports ahead of a new iPhone launch, for instance. That, combined with the increasing agreement of the details contained within the reports, is a good sign that the information they present is reliable.
Apple introducing a rectangular display in its smartwatch could mean we’ll see something more akin to the FuelBand-esque concepts being thrown around, but it’s still too early to tell what this might look like based on available information. It sounds like it will almost certainly plug into Health, Apple’s new fitness and wellness-tracking app coming in iOS 8 in the fall.
Source: TechCrunch