Wednesday 11 November 2015

Mobiles and wearables

There's always a lot at Sympsium, and I went to two sessions which were very interesting. One on the direction mobile is moving in, and one on wearables. The following is a summary of both sessions.

Seems to be general agreement that we are moving towards the post app area, where intelligent assistants (think Cortana and Siri) will provide control and automation and carry out takes for us without apps.

Technical trends affecting mobility:

Algorithms will drive innovation. One University has taken the accelerator information and can work out if you're happy or not! Weables can detect if your drinking by the movement of the accelerometer.

Device technologies matter less, supporting technologies matter more including electronics round the edge such as iBeacons

Social and political issues such as privacy, security, ethics will become more important

Services- mobile is an integral part of services such as Uber

 

Two platforms will dominate.

Smartphones - Apple and Samsung dominating with a long tail of small vendors. Some vendors will struggle

For platforms, iOS and android dominating. Be cautious of Windows 10 phones

Wireless getting more complex. No standards for IoT.

Who will drive the future of mobility? Different companies in different spaces:


Mobile and IoT will drive innovation. Some things already available: Selfie drones camera fastened to you wrist which can fly away to take a selfie). Smart beds. Smart furniture. Smart tags to track everything. Motorcycle helmet using smartphone to see what's behind you ( Skully)

App fatigue happening. Research says we are not downloading as many apps as we used to.

We should be using mobility to enable digital workplace innovation to create mobile digital workers.

One of biggest disruptions facing us is windows 10. Will hit us in 2016/17. Cortana is everywhere, on phones, tablets and PCs., and will be an integral part of it. Speaking to machines will be common place. Update model for windows 10 is very different. Need to start looking at it now,

 

Wearables

So much more than smart watches. A lot more.

Head up displays. Displays in contact lenses. Smart clothing. Clothes that adjust to fit you.

Doppler, wear on wrist and keeps you awake and alert. Wearables for pets.

Smart finger nail

Smart dress with 10s thousands LEds

Smart bike helmet can fire air bag

EEG sensor wear on head can control games

At the moment, market is very immature. Low entry barriers with many innovators. Very fragmented technology, no standards. Rapidly evolving, things come and go, short life spans. Battery life still a problem. Useability and security challenges. Lot of current technology very proprietary.

New consumer habits will emerge.

Will be a huge market. 500m unit shipments by 2020. Will become mainstream consumer products. Prices will fall. Health and fitness wearables being subsided by health insurance companies.

Key trends

Android watches will be leading smart watch in terms of shipment numbers. Lower unit price. More open system.

Apple will have lower shipment numbers. But higher unit prices. More closed system.

Some proprietary niche/specialised vendors will appear and survive.

Biggest use case at moment is notification, glance able information. Discrete notifications Short messages, email headers, sms. Proximity alerts. Service alerts. navigation.

 

 

 

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