By the end of the decade, smartwatches from Apple Inc and others might elicit guffaws rather than envy. At least, that is the view of Montblanc International GmbH’s Alexander Schmiedt, who has developed an electronic watchband for Swiss luxury timepieces that tracks steps, reads e-mail and even helps take selfies.
The speed at which gadgets evolve poses a design challenge to the 400-year-old Swiss watchmaking industry, Montblanc managing director for watches Schmiedt said in an interview.
High-end wristwatches are made to last, while electronic devices become disposable within years, as seen in the demise of the 1980s calculator watch, he said.
Photo: Bloomberg
“Our products should have very long life cycles,” Schmiedt said at Montblanc’s watch factory in an Art Nouveau villa in the rural Swiss town of Le Locle. “In modern technologies, the life cycle is exactly the opposite. It may be the hottest thing today, and in one year it is already outdated, and in two years you are made fun of for still using it.”
Montblanc, owned by South African billionaire Johann Rupert’s Compagnie Financiere Richemont SA, has created a luxury item with high-tech appeal by putting the electronics in the watchband rather than the timepiece.
Montblanc’s US$390 “e-Strap” is to go on sale next month and accompanies its TimeWalker watches, which cost from US$3,700 to US$5,800.
Richemont is likely to embed technology only in watchbands, Rupert said on a conference call about full-year earnings announced on Friday.
Rupert owns almost every product that Apple has made, and was the first agent selling Apple devices in South Africa decades ago, he said.
“I love Apple, but just when I have gone and set everything up for an iPhone 5, the iPhone 6 is coming out and the cords change,” he said. “That is not to say the Apple Watch is not a great product. I predict it will do very well, but I do not think that customers are going to be ecstatic to throw away watches in one to two years when the technology is obsolete.”
The watchband device is the first luxury Swiss product to directly compete with the Apple Watch, which costs US$349 for the basic version and US$17,000 for an 18-karat gold model.
The e-Strap and compatible timepieces are to appear in Montblanc boutiques and retailers, such as Bloomingdale’s, in the US.
The e-Strap consists of a stainless steel display attached with a leather strap and designed to be on the backside of the wrist when the watch is on the front. A touchscreen displays arriving e-mails.
When connected to a smartphone, Montblanc’s device can navigate playlists. It has an activity tracker that allows users to set targets for calories burned and steps taken. The e-Strap can also trigger a smartphone’s camera, facilitating easier “selfie” shots and group photographs.
The watchband is compatible with devices from Samsung Electronics Co, Apple and others. The e-Strap also has a function to help the wearer find the watch or smartphone, as long as they are within 30m.
It needs a recharge every five days, the company said.
While it does make a Swiss watch “smart,” the e-Strap is not flawless, according to Mario Ortelli, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein in London.
“There are also disadvantages: fewer functionalities, smaller screen, less integration with other devices,” he said.
Swiss smartwatches are on the way, with LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE’s US$1,400 TAG Heuer smartwatch slated to reach consumers this year. Swatch is to introduce a New Gent timepiece with mobile payment functions for less than US$100 by August. IWC Schaffhausen — another brand owned by Richemont — also plans an intelligent watchband.
Schmiedt has said he hopes that the Apple Watch will succeed because it boosts consumer interest in timepieces. An Apple spokesman declined to comment.
WASHINGTON’S INCENTIVES: The CHIPS Act set aside US$39 billion in direct grants to persuade the world’s top semiconductor companies to make chips on US soil The US plans to award more than US$6 billion to Samsung Electronics Co, helping the chipmaker expand beyond a project in Texas it has already announced, people familiar with the matter said. The money from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act would be one of several major awards that the US Department of Commerce is expected to announce in the coming weeks, including a grant of more than US$5 billion to Samsung’s rival, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), people familiar with the plans said. The people spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the official announcements. The federal funding for
HIGH DEMAND: The firm has strong capabilities of providing key components including liquid cooling technology needed for AI servers, chairman Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday revised its revenue outlook for this year to “significant” growth from a “neutral” view forecast five months ago, due to strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers from cloud service providers. Hon Hai, a major assembler of iPhones that is also known as Foxconn, expects AI server revenues to soar more than 40 percent annually this year, chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) told investors. The robust growth would uplift revenue contribution from AI servers to 40 percent of the company’s overall server revenue this year, from 30 percent last year, Liu said. In the three-year period
LONG HAUL: Largan Energy Materials’ TNO-based lithium-ion batteries are expected to charge in five minutes and last about 20 years, far surpassing conventional technology Largan Precision Co (大立光) has formed a joint venture with the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) to produce fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, mobile electronics and electric storage units, the camera lens supplier for Apple Inc’s iPhones said yesterday. Largan Energy Materials Co (萬溢能源材料), established in January, is developing high-energy, fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries using titanium niobium oxide (TNO) anodes, it said. TNO-based batteries can be fully charged in five minutes and have a lifespan of 20 years, a major advantage over the two to four hours of charging time needed for conventional graphite-anode-based batteries, Largan said in a
Taiwan is one of the first countries to benefit from the artificial intelligence (AI) boom, but because that is largely down to a single company it also represents a risk, former Google Taiwan managing director Chien Lee-feng (簡立峰) said at an AI forum in Taipei yesterday. Speaking at the forum on how generative AI can generate possibilities for all walks of life, Chien said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) — currently among the world’s 10 most-valuable companies due to continued optimism about AI — ensures Taiwan is one of the economies to benefit most from AI. “This is because AI is