Apple spotlights apps to woo Watch buyers
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Apple is turning to partners’ applications to persuade consumers to pay between $349 and $17,000 for its new Watch, as it launched its first new category of device since Tim Cook succeeded Steve Jobs as chief executive.
Monday’s unveiling of the highest profile wearable device to date focused on messaging, health and telling the time even as Mr Cook previewed third-party apps that will let users be more productive, unlock doors and view photos.
“Apple brings a whole new personal dimension in timekeeping that’s never been done before,” Mr Cook, who first revealed the Watch in September, told an audience of hundreds of reporters, partners and Apple employees at the Yerba Buena centre in San Francisco.
“It’s a revolutionary new way to communicate with others and it’s a comprehensive fitness companion,” he said. “There will be some great third party apps . . . When you unleash that creativity it’s incredible.”
The Watch will have a battery life of 18 hours, Mr Cook said, and incorporate the Apple Pay mobile payments system and Siri, Apple’s virtual assistant. It will go on sale in nine countries from Australia to the US on April 24.
Under the design leadership of Sir Jonathan Ive, Apple has wooed the fashion industry with a stylish array of finishes and bands Mr Cook called “absolutely fabulous”, with pricing running from $349 for the Sport version to $10,000-$17,000 for the Edition, which features a gold case.
In a nod to both fashion and fitness, Mr Cook shared the stage with Christy Turlington Burns, model, marathon runner and founder of Every Mother Counts, a maternal health organisation, who features in marketing for the Watch.
However, some tech analysts have questioned whether its compact colour touchscreen and novel “digital crown” controller can win over those consumers who have not been tempted to buy existing smartwatches from the likes of Samsung, Motorola or Pebble.
Wall Street forecasts for the device’s unit sales in its first full year on the market range between 20m and 30m.
Only owners with iPhones launched since 2012 — estimated to be more than 300m people — will find their smartphone is compatible with the Watch when it goes on sale next month.
Alongside the health-tracking, messaging, payment and timekeeping functions Apple has created as tent pole features for its smartwatch, Mr Cook introduced apps from social networks such as Facebook, Instagram, WeChat and Twitter, sports scores from ESPN and Major League Baseball and transport services such as car-hailing app Uber and American Airlines ticketing.
Advocates for the Watch say that it can reduce the estimated 150 times a day that smartphone owners check their mobile devices.
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Starwood Hotels’ “keyless” app will allow wearers to bypass the front desk by checking in via Apple Watch and then unlock the door of rooms at its W and Aloft hotels using their Watch.
Stephen Gates, creative director at Starwood, said the company had experimented with other wearables such as Google Glass but sees Apple Watch as “a platform that was more substantial than we’d seen before”.
“When you see a company like Apple, history is littered with people prognosticating the iPhone or iPad is going to fail and it’s worked out pretty well so far,” Mr Gates told the FT.
“Apple have always been really good at understanding that they need to be able to put out a quality device with core apps and functionality but that the development community and their apps are really what brings the device to life.”
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