可穿戴设备市场迟迟未见“引爆点”

Google leapt back into the smartwatch market this week with its first significant update to Android Wear in three years. Yet the launch of the new operating system, and accompanying watches from LG and Verizon comes at a moment of crisis for the wearable technology industry.

谷歌(Google)最近在智能手表市场再次有了大动作，发布了三年来对Android Wear的首个重大升级产品。然而，这个新操作系统以及搭载该系统的来自LG和Verizon的智能手表问世之际，整个可穿戴技术行业正处于危机之中。

Once tipped as the next big tech market after smartphones, wearables pioneers such as Fitbit and Jawbone are struggling and laying off staff, while others, including Motorola and Pebble, have abandoned the market.

可穿戴设备一度被认为将是继智能手机之后，下一个拥有广大市场的科技产品，如今该领域的先驱如Fitbit、Jawbone却处境艰难，落到裁员的地步，摩托罗拉(Motorola)和Pebble等其他一些制造商则停止向这个市场迈进。

Last week, Apple hailed record sales of its Watch, widely seen as the market leader, in the holiday quarter after revenues for the device declined earlier in the year. “We couldn’t be more excited about Apple Watch,” chief executive Tim Cook said, hailing the “huge potential for wearables going forward”.

苹果(Apple)前不久声称，其手表产品Apple Watch在假日季度(holiday quarter)销售创纪录，扭转了去年早些时候销售收入下滑的趋势。Apple Watch被广泛视为是市场领军产品。苹果首席执行官蒂姆•库克(Tim Cook)表示：“我们对Apple Watch感到无比兴奋。”他盛赞“可穿戴技术在未来有巨大潜力”。

Much of that potential, however, is yet to be realised.

然而，这种潜力有很大一部分还有待挖掘。

“Without a doubt, wearables have failed to live up to the hype by any measure,” says Ben Wood, analyst at CCS Insight, a tech and telecoms consultancy. “In general, it still feels like a solution looking for a problem.”

科技与电信业咨询公司CCS Insight的分析师本•伍德(Ben Wood)表示：“毫无疑问，以任何标准衡量，可穿戴技术都未能达到炒作中宣称的高度。总体上，它仍让人感觉像是带着解决方案找问题。”

Apple does not break out sales of its Watch, leaving analysts’ guesses for its growth rate in the quarter ranging from 20 per cent to just 2 per cent.

苹果并未透露该季度Apple Watch的销量数字，因此分析师们对其销量增长率的估计值相差很大，在2%至20%之间。

According to research group Strategy Analytics, which made the more pessimistic estimate for Apple Watch, global smartwatch shipments grew just 1 per cent in 2016 to 21.1m. Even optimists say that Apple Watch sales barely grew over the full year.

研究集团Strategy Analytics对Apple Watch销量的估计就偏于悲观——据该机构测算，2016年全球智能手表出货量仅增长了1%，达到2110万部。而即使是乐观者也表示，Apple Watch全年销量几乎没有增长。

Strategy Analytics pegged Apple’s smartwatch market share at 55 per cent last year, followed by Samsung at 11 per cent and “others” at 34 per cent. “Others” includes many based on Google’s software, which any manufacturer can use with its Android smartphones.

Strategy Analytics估计去年苹果在智能手表市场占有55%的份额，三星(Samsung)占11%，“其他”占34%。“其他”中包括了许多采用谷歌软件的制造商——任何制造商都可以在其搭载Android系统的智能手机上使用谷歌软件。

The new Android Wear 2.0 adds Google’s Assistant, a voice-activated digital helper, as well as apps that run on the device, rather than relying on a paired smartphone. The new software was first announced last May, with Alphabet-owned Google blaming the launch’s delay on taking extra time to refine the technology.

新推出的Android Wear 2.0增添了语音激活的数字助理——谷歌的Assistant，并新增了多款应用，可以在手表上直接运行，而不必依赖配对的智能手机。隶属Alphabet旗下的谷歌在去年5月首次宣布了Android Wear 2.0，该系统之所以迟迟没有推出，谷歌表示主要是为了有更多时间打磨技术。

“I think the delay was Google struggling to work out what it would need to do in order to reinvigorate the platform,” says Mr Wood. “It’s hard to see that there is a major disruption with this new version.”

伍德表示：“我认为，推迟是因为谷歌很难想出要怎么做才能为该平台注入新的活力。新版本很难看到大的突破。”

At a time when Amazon’s Echo speaker and its Alexa assistant is seeing rapid growth, the inclusion in Android Wear of Google’s Assistant — similar to Apple Watch’s Siri — could help voice control reach a “tipping point”, he says, “but it’s far from being a slam dunk”.

他说，在亚马逊(Amazon)的Echo音箱及Alexa数字助理取得快速发展之际，Android Wear系统中加入了与Apple Watch的Siri类似的谷歌Assistant，可能会有助于其语音控制技术到达一个“引爆点”，“不过这远远算不上王牌”。

The long tail of smartwatch makers runs from traditional watchmakers such as Fossil to sports brands such as New Balance. So far, few are shipping in meaningful scale. “For all the players, Apple included, it’s a narrow market,” said Aymar de Lencquesaing, president of Lenovo-owned Motorola, in an interview at the Consumer Electronics Show last month.

智能手表制造商的身后有大量尾随者，既有Fossil等传统手表制造商，也有新百伦(New Balance)之类的运动品牌。到目前为止，几乎没有公司做到了大规模出货。上月在消费电子展(Consumer Electronics Show)上接受采访时，联想(Lenovo)旗下摩托罗拉的总裁艾玛•迪-伦奎赛恩(Aymar de Lencquesaing)表示：“对所有参与者、包括苹果来说，这都是个狭窄的市场。”

While its latest Moto 360 smartwatch can be updated to the new Android Wear 2.0, the company has said it does not immediately plan to release a new smartwatch to coincide with Google’s latest launch. Mr de Lencquesaing believes that having to connect a smartwatch to a smartphone via Bluetooth, rather than being able to operate fully independently, is a “limitation”. “That tethering limits the market because some people are going to feel it’s just as fine to have it in their pocket and they don’t need to have it on their wrist,” he says.

尽管摩托罗拉最新的Moto 360智能手表可以升级到新的Android Wear 2.0操作系统，该公司表示并没有在近期推出新款智能手表以配合谷歌升级Android Wear的计划。迪-伦奎赛恩认为，智能手表必须通过蓝牙与智能手机相关联，而不能完全独立操作，是一种“限制”。“这种关联限制了市场，因为一些人会觉得有口袋里的手机就行了，他们不需要戴在手腕上的智能手表，”他说。

While Motorola is still dedicating “some resources” to building a standalone smartwatch, overcoming that problem “requires a level of integration with the [mobile network] operators that is not trivial. I’m questioning whether the maturity of the industry is there yet”, Mr de Lencquesaing says.

尽管摩托罗拉依然将“一些资源”投入到开发独立操作的智能手表之中，克服这个难题“需要与(移动网络)运营商在一定程度上相互整合，这不是一件能够轻易做到的事。我在怀疑，这个行业是否已经成熟，”迪-伦奎赛恩说。

A deeper problem is that even customers who buy smartwatches end up not using them. A recent survey of 9,592 consumers in the US, UK and Australia by Gartner, the research group, found that 29 per cent of smartwatch owners abandon them, which its analysts called a “serious problem for the industry”.

更深层的问题是，购买了智能手表的顾客最后也可能不使用它们。研究集团高德纳(Gartner)最近对美国、英国和澳大利亚的9592名消费者进行的调查表明，29%的智能手表用户将其弃之不用，该集团分析师称这是一个“行业性的严重问题”。

While Moto presses pause, others are forging ahead in the hopes that fresh innovations will catch consumers’ imaginations. Fitbit has been building out its smartwatch capabilities, with the recent acquisitions of start-ups Coin, Pebble and Vector Watch. Fitbit said last week that it would cut about 6 per cent of its workforce after holiday quarter revenues would come in lower than expected at up to $580m — almost half Wall Street’s estimates as recently as November.

尽管摩托罗拉暂停推进，其他制造商仍在继续努力前进，希望新的创新能够激发消费者的想象力。Fitbit一直在发展其在智能手表领域的实力，最近收购了初创公司Coin、Pebble和Vector Watch。近日Fitbit表示将裁员约6%，其假日季度的收入将低于预期，最高为5.8亿美元——几乎是华尔街在去年11月预期的数字的一半。

Yet despite the scale of the shortfall, Fitbit chief James Park described the market as being in a “temporary slowdown and transition period”.

然而，尽管与预期相差很大，Fitbit首席执行官詹姆斯•朴(James Park)称该市场处于“暂时的放缓和过渡期”。

While some are hoping that tie-ups with fashion and jewellery brands will boost wearables’ appeal, others are looking beyond the wrist for other places on the body that can monitor health, from shoes to ears and even fingers.

一些人希望，与时尚和珠宝品牌合作能够提高可穿戴设备的吸引力，还有一些人正在寻找可以监测健康状况的手腕以外的其他身体部位，从脚到耳朵，甚至手指。

Motiv, a start-up based in San Francisco, has spent the last three years incorporating many of the sensors traditionally found in a fitness tracking wristband — including step counter and heart rate monitor — into a ring.

旧金山初创公司Moti过去3年一直致力于将传统上健康追踪腕带使用的许多传感器——包括计步器和心率监测器——整合到戒指上。

“With wearables today, we are at the stage of lipstick on pigs,” says co-founder Curt von Badinski, referring to fashion brand partnerships. “They keep doing the same thing but changing the look of it a bit . . . We take over what you do with your typical wearable and put it on your finger.”

“就今天的可穿戴设备而言，行业还处在给猪涂口红的阶段，”该公司联合创始人库尔特•冯巴丁斯基(Curt von Badinski)在谈到可穿戴设备与时尚品牌的合作时说，“他们继续在做同样的事情，只把外观改变了一点……我们接手了他们对典型可穿戴设备所做的事情，并且要让它能戴在你的手指上。”

Motiv’s $200 device, whose curved batteries last for three to five days, goes on sale in the spring.

Motiv的设备配备的弯曲电池能够续航3到5天，即将在春天上架销售，售价200美元。