Apple is expected to launch the much talked about iWatch this October. The cash-rich company has since hired TAG Heuer sales director Patrick Pruniaux to give a “Swiss made” label to the iWatch. And it has just poached two more engineers from Nike – Ryan Bailey and Jon Gale – to the team. Bailey was in the product development while Gale was working on hardware and firmware during their time with Nike.

By hook or by crook, Apple has to release its own version of wearable watch. The expected iPhone 6 launch will not stop Apple’s stock selldown if it doesn’t release iWatch. It’s not too difficult to apprehend why, considering the fierce competition from Android watch – first by Samsung and now my LG. Still, the main question from the consumers will still be the pricing.

 

Samsung Gear 2 costs a whopping US$300 bucks, while LG’s G Watch is slightly cheaper at US$229 a piece. Just like Samsung, LG’s G Watch is both water-proof and dust-proof. Naturally Apple’s iWatch should have this feature as well. Heck, Apple’s iWatch should be better than these Android watches, if it plans to make it a blockbuster success.

Since Apple is late to the smartwatch party, will it sell iWatch at a freaking good price to give Samsung and LG a run for their money? If they can sell iPhone 5S from US$199 (16GB), surely they can sell iWatch for the same price, if not lower. Besides, how hard could it be to make a smartwatch compares to a smartphone. To see how simplistic an Android watch is made of, let’s see the components inside a LG’s G Watch.

 

A teardown was done recently by iFixit team by taking it apart. Surprisingly, the Android smartwatch is not that sophisticated or complex. The design was as simple as a Casio watch during the 1970s, literaly speaking (*grin*). Here’s what you have in a US$229 smartwatch – strap, casing, vibrator, LCD screen, rubber gasket, antenna, battery and of course the motherboard. It has the following basic specification:

• 1.65” IPS LCD
• 400 mAh battery
• Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 400 processor with 1.2GHz CPU
• 512 MB RAM / 4 GB Flash
• 9 Axis (Accelerometer/Compass/Gyro)
• Bluetooth 4.0

 

Having taken apart a Samsung Gear 2 before, the team were surprised that the external and internal design of LG’s G Watch was quite similar to the former. Could it be that LG actually clones Samsung’s smartwatch? Besides a trickier strap removal process, the rest of the components were quite similar. And the teardown process was quite smooth and easy.

Judging from the simple design and components used to manufacture a LG’s G Watch, it seems both Samsung and LG are making tons of money and have been laughing all the way to the bank. How could such a simple watch costs more than an iPhone 5S (16GB)? Enjoy your profit while you can, Samsung and LG. Apple’s iWatch will make you run for your money (*hopefully*).

 

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July 10th, 2014 by financetwitter

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