According to a new report by cnet, it looks as though Google will be unveiling plans for a Nexus smartwatch next month – prior to its official launch at Google I/O in June. Like the Nexus 4 and Nexus 5, it seems that LG might also be manufacturing the Nexus smartwatch. Fortunately, it’s probable that Google will continue with their existing Nexus model, therefore maintaining full control over the software that the watch will run and leave the hardware specifications for the watch to LG.
So far, there isn’t a lot of detail in regards to the specifications of the Nexus smartwatch, although Google will also be announcing a new smartwatch OS for manufacturers to build their devices upon. Seeing as though Samsung have ditched Android for their own Tizen OS in their recently announced Gear 2 smartwatch, it is about time that Google released a standardised OS for manufacturers to (hopefully) use with their upcoming smartwatch devices.
The new smartwatch OS will base itself primarily around the Google Now feature within Android, therefore it will be able retrieve information such as emails, weather, calendar events, SMS’s, incoming calls, etc. from your connected smartphone via Bluetooth. Hopefully with this new OS, Google will release a series of API’s for developers to interface their existing applications – so they may be controlled from the smartwatch.
What are your thoughts of LG manufacturing the Nexus smartwatch? Do you think there is a need for a standardised OS for smartwatches?
Very exciting!
A standardised OS will make it possible to grow an apps store for smartwatches.
Right now, there’s almost as many smartwatch OSes as there’s makes of smartwatches. This market fragmentation slows app dev, and consumer interest.