Hey guys it’s Greg with Apple Explained, and today we’re going to take a peek inside
the secretive Apple Watch development process and the updates it’s received since its
introduction. This topic won last week’s voting poll and if you didn’t get to vote,
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When Tim Cook unveiled the Apple Watch in September 2014, it ushered in a new era for
the company since Apple had never made a wearable device before. And as you can imagine, it
was no overnight project. In fact, the foundation of the Apple Watch stretches all the way back
to 2002, when Apple’s design team requested several high-end sportswatches from Nike.
Apple ended up receiving a couple different models including the Presto Digital Bracelets
and the aluminum Oregon Series Alti-Compass. This may have appeared to be an odd request
for Nike, but Scott Wilson, who was their creative director at the time said, "[I] was
flattered that they were requesting them. We thought they were only personal requests
but their materials guy followed up with many questions on the materials and processes.
They definitely drew upon watch industry techniques and manufacturing in their products since
the first iPhone.” This solid base of knowledge and experience in mobile devices eventually
led to Apple giving smartwatches some serious thought.
But before we get into the development of the Apple Watch itself, you might find it
interesting that Apple sort’ve already made a smartwatch back in 2010. And it was called
the 6th generation iPod Nano. Now obviously Apple didn’t market it as a smartwatch,
but this iPod nano did include a variety of watch faces. And third party manufactures
actually made watch bands for it. So many users wore the iPod nano on their wrist as
a watch and this became a popular trend among Apple fans at the time. And perhaps this further
encouraged Apple to create a proper smartwatch since users demonstrated interest in that
type of technology. Now let’s talk about the early days of Apple Watch development.
In 2011, Apple filed for several watch-related patents including a wristband which harnessed
kinetic energy from everyday wrist movements in order to recharge its battery. Patents
also suggested the device would include a curved touchscreen made from flexible glass,
along with numerous sensors for monitoring exercise patterns and heart rate. And since
many of these features were eventually included in the Apple Watch, we can assume the Apple
Watch project was official formed in 2011, shortly after Steve Jobs death. During this
time, Apple invited a series of watch historians to speak at their Cupertino campus, likely
as a way to educate their employees and spark ideas for how their own smartwatch should
function.
Now the following year, in 2012, rumors about an Apple smartwatch were already growing.
Most of this speculation was founded upon a Chinese news site which claimed Apple was
working on a new device with Intel chips, low-power Bluetooth technology, a 1.5” touchscreen,
and voice controls. And this information would turn out to be quite accurate, although no
one was sure of it at the time. I should also mention that the Apple Watch was referred
to as iWatch, both internally at Apple and externally by suspicious consumers. It wouldn’t
bear the name Apple Watch until its introduction in 2014. And when Tim Cook was asked why it
wasn’t named iWatch, Cook simply said, “I think Apple watch sounds better, don’t you?”
Now 2013 is when the Apple Watch project reached a big milestone. It was moved out of the experimentation
phase and into official production. This meant Apple began investing more resources into
the Apple Watch and had to prepare for mass production. And more suspicions about an Apple
smartwatch were raised when an unnamed employee claimed Apple held discussions with their
manufacturing partner Hon Hai Precision Industry regarding the production of a device that
was neither a smartphone nor a tablet.
Now because of all the chatter and anticipation surrounding Apple’s potential smartwatch,
some companies wanted to beat Apple to the market and position themselves as a pioneer
in the industry. One of those companies was Samsung. They released their own smartwatch
called Galaxy Gear in September 2013 and it was a huge flop. Only 800,000 units were shipped
around the world and we’re not sure how many of those unit were actually purchased
since Samsung never released those numbers. But what we do know is that at least 30% of
Galaxy Gear watches sold at Best Buy were returned by unsatisfied customers. Critics
were also unsatisfied with the device, some of their complaints included an uncomfortable,
inflexible strap since some components were housed inside it, it’s limited functionality
of apps, an inconsistent notification system, and poor battery life.
I think The Verge it summed up quite well when they said, “as with industrial design,
software engineering isn’t among Samsung’s strengths, and the results on the Gear are
a painful mix of unreliability and inadequacy.” The Unofficial Apple Weblog compared the Galaxy
Gear to the sixth-generation iPod Nano, considering the three-year-old MP3 player to be a "better,
cheaper smartwatch" than the Galaxy Gear because it wasn’t dependent on a "host" smartphone
or tablet, and contained more features than the Galaxy Gear.
Now, by mid 2013 Apple had already filed for 79 watch-related patents and they registered
the name iWatch in Japan and Russia. And during an interview at the AllThingsDigital conference,
Apple CEO Tim Cook hinted at the possibility of developing a wearable device. He said,
”It's an area that's ripe for exploration, it's ripe for us to get excited about, lots
of companies will play in this space.” As for other wearable devices like Google Glass,
Cook wasn’t so sure, "I'm interested in a great product. I wear glasses because I
have to, I don't know a lot of people who wear them because they don't have to.”
Now from 2013 to 2014, Apple began reorganizing and recruiting talent to aid in the Apple
Watch’s development. The reorganization happened with Jeff Williams, the company's
senior vice president for operations, who was assigned as head of the Apple Watch project,
responsible for overseeing logistics & planning with suppliers like Foxconn. And Apple recruited
Angela Ahrendts, CEO of Burberry, as the head of their retail and online stores. And the
health features included on the watch were made possible by two medical technology experts
that Apple hired. And finally, the vice president of sales for luxury watch manufacturer TAG
Heuer joined the team in 2014.
Now hiring all of these people with experience in the watch industry raised eyebrows in the
tech community. Apple was essentially signaling that a smartwatch would be released, and it
was only a matter of time.
In September 2014 the wait was over. [clip] Apple finally revealed the Apple Watch at
the "One More Thing…" event along with the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. It featured Apple’s
single-core S1 system-on-chip and relied on a paired iPhone for location services since
it didn’t include GPS. Although it did include something called a linear actuator which Apple
marketed as a "Taptic Engine" that provided haptic feedback in different situations, like
when an alert or a notification was received. The watch was also equipped with a built-in
heart rate sensor, which used infrared and visible-light LEDs in addition to photodiodes.
Now one problem with a touchscreen this small is that you can’t pinch to zoom, so Apple
created the digital crown to serve in its place. With it, you could zoom in and out,
raise and lower the volume, and scroll through menus. Another issue with small screens is
that they can’t display very much content at once. And Apple remedied this by incorporating
something called force touch, where users could access extra features when they hard-pressed
on the display.
Now let’s talk about the specs. All versions of the first-generation Apple Watch had 8 GB
of storage; but the operating system only allowed users to store up to 2 GB of music
and 75 MB of photos. It also featured splash resistance, bluetooth 4.0, a 450 nit OLED
retina display, a 520 MHz single-core processor, and 512 MB of RAM.
Now there were a few different models of the Apple Watch. First, the Apple Watch sport,
which was aluminum and started at $349. Second, The regular Apple Watch, which was stainless
steel and started at $549. And third, the Apple Watch Edition, which was gold and started
at $10,000. But just one year later Apple stopped selling the Apple Watch Edition in
gold, opting instead for a nice ceramic finish that brought its price down to $1249. Now
you be thinking, why did Apple even sell a $10,000 golden smartwatch to begin with? Well
it wasn’t something Tim Cook supported. It was actually Apple’s chief designer Jonathan
Ives who pushed hard to make the golden Apple Watch a reality. He believe that in order
to be taken seriously by luxury Swiss watchmakers, Apple had to create a luxury watch of their
own. But the problem is that smartwatches eventually become obsolete, whereas mechanical
watches last a lifetime.
Now the Series 1 and Series 2 Apple Watches were released at the end of 2016 and provided
some nice upgrades to the original. Both models added a faster 780MHz dual-core processor,
while the series 2 had built-in GPS, water resistance up to 50 meters, a second-generation
OLED retina display with 1000 nits of brightness, and a larger capacity battery. Apple also
added two new models: Apple Watch Nike Plus and Apple Watch Hermes. What made these models
unique were their watch bands and watch faces that weren’t available to other users.
The next upgrade came with Series 3 near the end of 2017. These models added optional support
for LTE cellular connectivity which would add $10 to your monthly phone bill, bluetooth
4.2, an altimeter to measure flights climbed, and 768MB of RAM.
Reception to the Apple Watch was generally positive with some exceptions, especially
with the original release. Reviewers praised the watch's overall design and potential to
integrate into everyday life, but noted issues of speed and price. Many described the watch
as functional and convenient, while also felt it didn’t offer as much functionality as
smartphones had with their release. Farhad Manjoo of The New York Times thought the device
had a steep learning curve, saying it took him "three long, often confusing and frustrating
days" to become accustomed to it. But when reviewers compared it to competing products,
like Android Wear, they claimed "The Smartwatch Finally Makes Sense.” There was also mixed
opinions on battery life, Geoffrey Fowler of The Wall Street Journal said "the battery
lives up to its all-day billing, but sometimes just barely.” Others complained that there
just wasn’t much to do with it. Tim Bradshaw of the Financial Times used the Apple Watch
for a few days and concluded that there was no "killer application" so far besides telling
the time, which is the basic function of a wristwatch anyway.
There were also some issues with the Apple Watch heart monitor functioning correctly
for people with tattoos since the watch flashed green LED light at the skin and recorded the
amount of light that was absorbed by the blood. But under certain circumstances, like with
tattoos or other conditions, the skin wouldn’t allow the green light to be absorbed and therefore
provide inaccurate heart monitor results.
Since its release in 2015, the Apple Watch has become the number one smartwatch in the
world with about 24% of global marketshare and generates billions of dollars for Apple
each year. But it’s interesting to note that the watch hasn’t received a design
refresh yet. It carries the same look today as it did three and a half years ago, and
many are wondering how the Apple Watch will change when Apple does give it a new design.
Will it still have a rectangular design or will Apple go in the direction of the Moto
360 and create a circular Apple Watch? I personally enjoy the current design although I’d appreciate
a thinner profile since I have a tendency of hitting my watch on various things like
doorways.
But let me know in the comments what you’d like to see in a redesigned Apple Watch. And
if you want to vote for the next video topic, don’t forget to subscribe. Thanks for watching,
and I’ll see you next time.