Report: Microsoft Working on Touch-Screen Smartwatch
Report: Microsoft Working on Touch-Screen Smartwatch
Many of the world's leading tech brands - from Apple
to Samsung - are reportedly prepping wearable gadgets so as not to miss
what might be the "Next Big Thing." Now, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal, it appears that Microsoft is preparing its own entry into the wearable tech market via a smartwatch.Citing information from suppliers, the paper said Redmond is prepping a touch-based, watch-like device, and has placed orders for 1.5-inch displays. However, the source was unable to confirm whether or not this activity means that Microsoft plans to offer the supposed smartwatches commercially anytime soon.
In some ways, this development would appear, to those familiar with the company's past, as history repeating itself. Microsoft is well known as the first major consumer-facing brand to offer a viable tablet device, only to have that device fade from the public's memory when the iPad made its debut a few years ago. Similarly, Microsoft offered a kind of smartwatch platform as far back as 2002.
The platform was called the Smart Personal Object Technology (SPOT) platform, and it was designed to allow any number of items to receive FM transmissions delivering information such as news headlines and weather from MSN Direct. That platform allowed well-known watch companies such as Swatch (above), Fossil, Tissot, and Suunto to experiment with offering smartwatches to the public. In fact, Microsoft even constructed its own prototype smartwatch designed to show off what the platform was capable of offering to users. However, the SPOT smartwatches never really caught on, and by 2008 they were relegated to the dustbin of tech history.
Of course, the difference this time—assuming the reported devices are released in the near future—is that instead of waiting several years for the market to become saturated with competition, Microsoft would actually launch around the same time other, similar devices are rumored to be headed to consumers. So far the list of major brands reportedly working on launching a smartwatch includes Apple, Samsung, Google, and LG.
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