Apple Watch 2 Not Likely to See March Debut [Updated]

[galahan]

I recently bought a Garmin Forerunner 230, which is considered a pretty good watch for running. It's fine, but I found the interface to be quite painful. I considered an Apple watch but figured I could wait until the new one. Ultimately I'd like the watch to end up having awesome health and fitness tracking sensor (beyond what it already has e.g. blood pressure; glucose levels without need to draw blood[e.g. Glucowise]).

For this next version I'd really like them to add the following to the AW:
- GPS: This will allow me to leave my phone at home on runs. My garmin has GPS but you can't store music on the device so I have to take my phone anyway).
- "Waterproofness": Just so that i don't have to think about it when I go for a swim or take a shower.

Battery life seems fine from what I've read, though GPS would be a concern. I wonder if it could fake GPS by downloading a map and then just estimating by distance and direction.

 

[sir1963nz]

iPhone 6C + new macs isn't really much of an event however. Unless the macs are a complete redesign (like a new Macbook Pro generation)

I have heard that a new Mac Pro will be announced, the last update was almost 3 years ago.

 

[Ursadorable]

I ordered, and immediately returned without opening an AppleWatch (mostly because I changed my mind about the colour once investigating options for 3rd party bands). And now I have the option to wait and see if there's an new version around the corner. I'm kinda torn to be honest. I hate to have it arrive, and a new one comes out 2 months later.

 

[Denmac1]

apple decides it.Not the people who spent 400 dollars for a heart monitor.

For those of us that have had or have a heart condition, this is very good for me. And it does some other functions as well, so it's just not the expenditure for just one purpose.
Overall,I'm satisfied with the watch and serves my needs well enough at this point in time. I think the issue that Apple is having is, as said on some other threads, that all their software is lagging behind. Craig, Jeff and Jony need to take this to a higher level. Yes, we know there will always be some bugs, but it seems more often than not, something comes up on a regular basis that shouldn't be an issue, such as the battery indicator on the phone.

 

[jigzaw]

I haven't been following the Watch OS 3 rumors, but it seems to me since OS 2 was introduced just a few months after OS 1, March seems as good a time as any for OS 3 and a new Watch announcement. That would be faster than most of us expected, but good news for me since I'm in the position of wanting a watch but not wanting to buy first gen right before gen two comes out. So.. I'm just kinda waiting to see. If Gen 2 is still a year away, then I'd grab the current Sport model and enjoy it 'til then, but if it's coming out in 3-5 months, then I'll wait. Makes me wish the companies would be a little less secretive so we can plan accordingly.

As to the Fall cycle, does Apple really want to be in the business of only releasing new products during one season? We get new devices/phones/smartwatches all year long from other companies. If we're primed to know that new things only come from Apple in September-November then I think their March-August sales would be very weak. Also, spreading the products out lets people psychologically justify buying more devices. I might buy a phone in Sept, and iPad in December and a Watch in April, but there's no way I'm buying all three at the same time.

 

[Mr Staunton]

Great, so I waited (read it as the wife "suggested" that I wait) for the 2nd gen watch early 2016, and now it is possible it might not be until later in the year (I can see the wife smiling now). curse! curse! curse!

 

[Bazooka-joe]

I can't see a new iPhone, iPad and watch being released in the Fall within a three month period. I think they will release the watch in the Spring. A staggered delivery of new products is easier for the consumer to swallow.

 

[nicho]

I can't see a new iPhone, iPad and watch being released in the Fall within a three month period. I think they will release the watch in the Spring. A staggered delivery of new products is easier for the consumer to swallow.

iPad Air is the device most overdue a refresh. And iPad Pro is hardly a holiday purchase; for those who want it it's great but for others it's inconveniently large.

If they're going to stagger the devices, I'd argue iPad is most likely to move to spring.

 

[thekeyring]

Watch people will. And you have to ask yourself, why would Apple go to the trouble to enable multiple watches to a single iPhone with all the other software improvements they could be making if there wasn't a significant market for multiple watches per customer?

Developers.

 

[nicho]

Developers.

Why go to the lengths of including "auto switching" and such - things that make it easy for consumers but don't have too much benefit for a dev

 

[Popeye206]

My guess is the AppleWatch 2.0 will be in the first half of 2016. Why? Competition is heating up and I think there are many potential customers (such as myself) who are waiting for the 2nd generation product to come out. I don't think they'll wait until the WWDC as that has been traditionally software only... so I would expect something around April.

 

[JWD]

I think they should keep with the March/April timeline with the Apple Watch. That way you get an entire summer with a new product. Releasing it in the fall/winter is good for Christmas I guess but by the summer people will be already talking about the next watch. And let's admit it, summer time is when you should be in your prime.

 

[KikoPT]

The AppleWatch 1st gen is being launched in Portugal the coming Jan 29 (also in Malaysia and Czech Republic). I would be very very very pissed if they are launching a product in a Country and 3 months later a new one is released.

But being Apple, and the way they have been treating recently their Portuguese costumers, i dunno (check the prices, for one).

For me, it makes more sense for the Watch to be in a 2 year cycle.

 

[Mac 128]

The AppleWatch 1st gen is being launched in Portugal the coming Jan 29 (also in Malaysia and Czech Republic). I would be very very very pissed if they are launching a product in a Country and 3 months later a new one is released.

But being Apple, and the way they have been treating recently their Portuguese costumers, i dunno (check the prices, for one).

It makes more sense for the Watch should be in a 2 year cycle.

What makes you think you'll get the 2G Watch 3 months later? You can travel to any adjacent country in Europe to see and buy the 1G Watch now, or place an order online from anywhere in the world. Wal-Mart just got the Watch in the US just in time for Christmas, which similarly made the Watch available in areas of the US it wasn't before, but just because rural America got the watch 6 months late, doesn't mean Apple's not going to upgrade the watch for everyone who bought it 9 months earlier, specially if the roll out is similar.

Moreover, I don't expect the 1G Watch will be discontinued when the 2G Watch is released. So anyone who buys one in January, is not going to be instantly outdated 3 months later. Three months is an eternity in the tech world. If anything I would expect the "S" cycle to apply to the watch every 6 months, with internal improvements, and an annual case up date. But unless Apple treats the Watch differently than every watch maker on the planet, they will likely build a collection of styles and features over time, rather than focus on one static model they discontinue and replace every two years -- and this first one may be a major update in much the same way as the iPhone, and iPad were from Gen 1 to Gen 2 to make two distinct choices for the customer.

 

[ChrisCW11]

Personally if I were Apple I would be back at the drawing board and figuring out why Apple Watch was one of the worst rolled out iDevices in over a decade rather than trying to do an incremental 12 month upgrade of a failed product.

Also Apple has to understand they are the new Timex, not the new Rolex. There is a reason why Timex doesn't offer a $10,000 gold Ironman model because it is stupid to invest that kind of money into something that is easily and needing to be replaced by the next year's model.

 

[foxkoneko]

nooooo I wanted to upgrade already

 

[MrUNIMOG]

Personally if I were Apple I would be back at the drawing board and figuring out why Apple Watch was one of the worst rolled out iDevices in over a decade rather than trying to do an incremental 12 month upgrade of a failed product.

Also Apple has to understand they are the new Timex, not the new Rolex. There is a reason why Timex doesn't offer a $10,000 gold Ironman model because it is stupid to invest that kind of money into something that is easily and needing to be replaced by the next year's model.

What makes you think it was the "worst rolled out" device in over a decade? According to even the least optimistic analysts it had much better initial sales than the first iPhone in 2007, which is not quite a decade ago.

The Apple Watch is far from what you'd call a "failed product"... That is for sure, even though Apple hasn't published any official numbers yet.

 

[dwsolberg]

I'm wondering if the pace of change for the watch isn't going to be much slower than for the iPhone. The processor that's already in the watch is actually much speedier than people realize. I think what's holding the watch back is that the battery power just isn't enough to do everything fast. Because battery capacity improves by less than 5% a year (and that's optimistic), I just don't see there's much that's going to improve in the watch quickly. True, they can make low-power displays and low-power cpus, but I wonder if that's enough to make anything close to a big change. Given that, I'd guess that everything in the next Watch is going to be about either lower power consumption parts or more/better battery. I doubt that those who expect a smaller case are going to get what they want, but maybe the next watch will be some carbon fiber composite that uses less structural space and allows a bigger battery in a smaller case.

 

[robbyx]

What makes you think it was the "worst rolled out" device in over a decade? According to even the least optimistic analysts it had much better initial sales than the first iPhone in 2007, which is not quite a decade ago.

I don't think it's valid to compare initial iPhone to initial Watch sales. The iPhone was a pretty revolutionary product. While there were phones that could access the internet, the user experience was horrible across the board. Apple put the first legitimate mobile web browser in one's pocket. They introduced a completely new way of interacting with technology via multitouch. They didn't just improve upon existing cell phones, they redefined the product category. The product itself was also limited to one carrier. And all of this is happening just as social media was truly becoming a thing and mobile connectivity was become an affordable reality.

It makes sense that iPhone wasn't a huge success right out of the gate. Expensive, restricted to one carrier, and a completely new way of looking at the cell phone, it would take time to build momentum. And that's exactly what happened. Prices came down, more carriers got the iPhone, mobile social media became a thing, and the buzz never stopped growing.

The Watch, on the other hand, is a dedicated iPhone accessory. With the exception of ~20 million loyal Mac users, all of the other hundreds of millions of iPhone customers had to be acquired, and that was hard work and took time. But now that they have been acquired and proven themselves repeat customers via iPhone upgrades, a paltry ~3% of the potential customer base (assuming ~300 million Watch-compatible iPhones in use and ~10 million Watches sold to date) have bought into the Watch. That's pretty weak by any measure. Even worse, there's absolutely NO buzz. If anything, I'd say the general public's view of the Watch ranges from indifference to derision. Apple did not wow with the Watch.

I've said this before. My general concern as a long-time customer and investor, is that Apple is losing focus. I don't see the wearables industry as a worthy place for Apple to focus attention and resources. If the Watch had sold ~30 million units, I'd shut up. But even with all that passion for iPhone, all the marketing blitz, the store redesigns, the Vogue attention, etc., it was a very tepid launch and I think that speaks to the general lack of interest in wearables. There's definitely a niche market, but I don't feel that niche is worth Apple's time. The real test will be sales a year from now. Will they have grown, or will we discover that it's only 3-5% of the installed base who care about the Watch?

 

[iChrist]

I think Apple should shoot for something closer to a 2 year cycle for the watches. Just seems like it would make more people willing to buy throughout the year.

However long it takes them to improve the clunky design of the current one, i'll wait.

 

[d0nK]

I still don't see the point of a wearing a watch if you have an iPhone.

 

[kerrikins]

I really saddens me that Apple thinks someone would buy a new watch every year. They've updated the Thunderbolt display with variants without calling it Thunderbolt display 2, 3, 4, etc. Why can't they do the same for the Apple Watch.

They have a tiny fraction of the market out there, of course they're going to keep releasing updates. It's not as though they've hit the ceiling cap of people who will ever buy Apple Watches in the world.

 

[AppleScruff1]

I think they should keep with the March/April timeline with the Apple Watch. That way you get an entire summer with a new product. Releasing it in the fall/winter is good for Christmas I guess but by the summer people will be already talking about the next watch. And let's admit it, summer time is when you should be in your prime.

But in half the world it's summer and in the other half it's winter.
[doublepost=1453171703][/doublepost]

I still don't see the point of a wearing a watch if you have an iPhone.

I don't see the point of wearing black shoes if you have brown ones.

 

[nicho]

I don't see the point of wearing black shoes if you have brown ones.

Arguably a poor metaphor. The black shoes would replace the brown. The watch and iPhone coexist together...

Perhaps you should have said "I don't see the point in wearing black shoes if you have black socks". I think that makes more sense

 

[Mac 128]

I've said this before. My general concern as a long-time customer and investor, is that Apple is losing focus. I don't see the wearables industry as a worthy place for Apple to focus attention and resources. If the Watch had sold ~30 million units, I'd shut up. But even with all that passion for iPhone, all the marketing blitz, the store redesigns, the Vogue attention, etc., it was a very tepid launch and I think that speaks to the general lack of interest in wearables. There's definitely a niche market, but I don't feel that niche is worth Apple's time. The real test will be sales a year from now. Will they have grown, or will we discover that it's only 3-5% of the installed base who care about the Watch?

I don't agree with this. Wearables are the future, and Apple would be foolish not to get into it now. They may have overextended themselves with the Watch, perhaps they shouldn't have tried to make it as big a product launch as the iPod, iPhone, & iPad ... Maybe something more like the TV, instead of $17,000 gold watches. Either way, once people start discovering what the watch can actually do, with an infrastructure to support it -- unlock doors, start cars, ID/security pass, health sensors, etc. -- then either the watch, or whatever it becomes, jewelry, clothing, glasses, etc. will become suddenly in demand. It's taken the TV 9 years to get to where it is, and it's still got a long way to go. The Wearable may take just as long, but they have to start somewhere.