Welcome to The Wearable Weekly, your trusted guide to all things wearable tech. If you only have time to read one thing about wearables this week, this is it. Don’t forget to subscribe to The Wearable Weekly using the form below to make sure it hits your email inbox every week!
Industry Highlights
Google I/O was filled with major wearable announcements yesterday but alas, no Google Glass 2. They did unveil the next version of Google Cardboard and the launch of iOS support for its VR system.
Oculus is getting sued by Total Recall Technologies for fraud. The Hawaii-based company says that Oculus CEO, Palmer Luckey, violated a confidentiality agreement he entered into with the company when Luckey worked there in 2011 by using information in his Oculus Kickstarter campaign.
Jawbone is suing rival Fitbit over data theft. Jawbone is suing Fitbit for poaching 15 of its staff members who reportedly copied intellectual property and trade data onto USB sticks before they left.
Statistics & Forecasts
Wearable band market grew over 150% as more than 7 million units were shipped in the first quarter of 2015 with Fitbit and Xiaomi Mi leading says Canalys (Canalys)
Canalys forecasts that 20 million Apple Watches will be shipped in 2015 (Canalys)
Tractica predicts a jump in enterprise and industrial wearable shipments from 166,000 units in 2013 to 27.5 million in 2020 (FierceMobile IT)
Smart Augmented Reality Glasses Shipments to Surpass 12 Million Units between 2015 and 2020, According to Tractica (BusinessWire)
Virtual reality headsets and content will be “the next mega tech theme” and a market worth more than $60 billion in a decade says Piper Jaffray (Bloomberg)
Android Wear now has over 4,000 dedicated apps according to Google (Android Central)
Device Announcements
GoPro announced a Six-Camera Spherical Array for virtual reality (Re/Code)
Google and GoPro have partnered to create a VR rig with 16 cameras (The Verge)
Aria gesture controller announced for Pebble and Android Wear smartwatches (TechCrunch)
Google announced the second version of Google Cardboard at Google I/O which now supports smartphones of up to 6″ (TechCrunch)
Fashion brand, Dior, announced it is launching Dior Eyes VR headset in select stores in June (PSFK)
LG G Watch R to receive Wi-Fi connectivity in a future “maintenance update” (Phonearena)
Lenovo unveiled a dual-screen smartwatch prototype (Engadget)
Lenovo unveiled smart shoe prototype that show your emotion (Mashable)
Consumer Oculus Rift expected in 2016 to be priced around $1,500 and be bundled with a PC (Re/Code)
Swatch re-confirmed that they are launching a connected smartwatch this Summer (WSJ)
Pebble Time is now shipping, pre-orders open June 22 (MobileSyrup)
Funding, Crowdfunding, and M&A
Apple has acquired augmented reality company Metaio (TechCrunch)
Facebook-owned Oculus has acquired UK company Surreal Vision (Ars Technica)
Major Milestones
Android Wear updated with gesture control and emoji recognition announced at I/O 2015 (TNW)
Google announced iOS support for Cardboard (TechCrunch)
Disney confirmed they are bringing “variations” of the MyMagic+ program (which includes the MagicBand) outside of Walt Disney World (Reuters)
Apple and IBM introduced Apple Watch support to some of the MobileFirst iOS enterprise apps (ComputerWorld)
Google Maps app is now on Android Wear (Engadget)
Xiaomi’s Mi band now syncs with Google Fit (Android Central)
Rumours
Apple is said to be working on Project Proactive which will include augmented reality (9to5 Mac)
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Don’t forget to subscribe to The Wearable Weekly using the form below to make sure it hits your email inbox every week!
