Yesterday news broke that Samsung were very disappointed with the amount of sales the Galaxy Gear had gotten for the first month. It stood at 50,000 units, according to reports, which is a small amount for a world wide smartwatch. That figure shocked us a little, but we were not surprised with the initial lack of sales it has been getting.
This is a smartwatch that was released compatible with one handset and then dribbled out availability for a few more over the last few weeks. When it comes to the average consumer, they aren’t going to know any of this. It’s either there to be used right now when they’re looking or it’s not. For the most part it just won’t be.
It’s hard enough as an Android enthusiast to keep tabs on updates going around two devices let alone expecting the average Joe to be in any kind of understand with what is going on here.
That doesn’t mean I don’t see a good future here, because I do. Wearable tech is something I see going places and fast. I fully expect smartwatches to drop the name smart and become the standardized watches of tomorrow. I see no point in keeping an old watch that does nothing more than tell the time when you can have one that does so much more. If you don’t want to use the features these new watches have then simply just looked at the time. It’s not like they really cost you much more than that anyway.
Today, flicking through news Samsung have come out to say that they moved 800,000 units are very pleased with this amount. It also just so happens to be a new record with the amount moved. This could be nothing more than a bluff from Samsung after wearing their heart on their sleeve yesterday about the truth and wishing they kept that knowledge behind closed doors.
Expect the sales to remain relatively low and the combination of Smartphone manufacturer, carrier and Android come up with a better solution to roll out these incremental updates to each device. It is this very thing that makes understanding who has a handset that can be hooked up to the Galaxy Gear and who can’t. Whatever the case, they all should be made compatible in the next two months. That’s about the time I expect sales to boom. Unfortunately, they have things a bit twisted lately. Only four days ago saw the gear get updated to include better notifications. They roll out this update before devices even have a connection on board? Crazy.