Ericsson report finds one-third of consumers polled have or want wearables

A new report from Ericsson AG suggests Apple Inc.’s upcoming Apple Watch could address a market that's far larger than what current wearable sales would indicate. In a worldwide study of more than 54,000 people, the technology maker examined the idea of the “quantified self,” in which individuals track their daily metrics such as calories consumed, steps taken or quality of sleep. Ericsson found that interest levels in wearables are much higher than actual use, and that about half of those surveyed who quantify their behaviour also use wearables. “This implies that, in the consumer’s mind, quantification of behaviour today starts with wearables,” said the report, which was released Thursday. “It also means that consumers see an opportunity to improve their health and fitness using various kinds of connected technology.” For Canada, the report found that 16 per cent of consumers quantify their behaviour, and a further 19 per cent are interested in doing so. The study also showed that 12 per cent of Canadian consumers use wearables, and another 17 per cent are interested in doing so. The report said that about 12 per cent of people worldwide are using wearables and twice as many want to, making the potential for adoption roughly one-third of the global consumer market. “Consumers may be delaying purchase, thinking that as smartphones already perform similar tasks. Wearables may not yet have found the right level of design and functionality,” the report said. In South Korea, where Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. is headquartered and which the report called a leading market for wearables, 35 per cent of consumers are interested in wearables but waiting for better devices, compared with 16 per cent who are already using them. According to a December 2014 release from International Data Corp., sales of wearables will grow by 70 per cent in 2015. The company earlier in 2014 predicted “hockey stick growth” in the wearables market. Rami Alhamad, founder of Toronto-based wearable manufacturer Push Inc., said consumers are just beginning to understand the potential of wearable devices though there is still much education that needs to be done. “I think we're just at the very cusp of the wearable takeover; you can only start seeing it now,” he said in a phone interview. He said that for a long time, the wearables market was focused on single devices that could monitor heart rate, track runs and provide other feedback about movement. Now, he said, the marketplace is moving toward specific devices like his company’s weight lifting-focused Push product, which attaches to a user’s forearm to track strength and reps in order to improve workouts. “Each wearable is really catered and designed for a certain segment," he said. "I don't think we're all making vacuum cleaners, even if we all get lumped into the same wearable category. It's really a lot more diverse with a lot of different devices.” The Push device went on sale to consumers in September. Alhamad said that, since then, the company has logged more than 1.3 million reps. Customers include both regular gym-goers and professionals, he said, including strength coaches and players with sports teams such as the Detroit Lions, the Philadelphia Flyers and the St. Louis Cardinals. Alhamad said the Push is the first wearable ever purchased for many of his customers. “We focus on meeting a true need in one section of the market," he said. “For us to succeed in the future, you really need to work in creating the content and the understanding on how this metric benefits the user.” Michael Bjorn, head of research at Ericsson, said in a phone interview that the report shows consumers actually see a wide range of possibilities for wearable devices from a range of service providers, including not just technology companies and medical providers, but municipal authorities and environmental protection agencies. In different markets, he noted, different types of wearable technology may be more appealing. While in the North American market, devices such as fitness trackers or heartbeat monitors are in demand, in developing countries such as China and India, wearables can meet more basic needs. In Delhi, 92 per cent of consumers see a wearable bracelet that checks air quality as something that would be useful, compared with 83 per cent in Beijing and 50 per cent in New York. "If you add up what people are saying, they are actually expecting many different types of service providers to be active in this field," he said. He pointed to a section in the survey that showed consumers expect some concepts, such as the wearable air-quality bracelet, to be provided by government or independent agencies, not tech companies. “This is going to be a rather complex ecosystem,” he said. “It’s not necessary that everything has to be in a product.” Bjorn cautioned that the wearable concepts in the survey were just potential products that the company has no intention of developing. He said Ericsson intends to do more research to find out how much consumers know about wearables. "Not many of these are available today," he said. "It's very difficult to say what are the exact levels of awareness, this is maybe a field that is evolving and developing as we speak.” The Ericsson report's data was based on a 2014 survey of 54,775 mobile-phone owners in 49 countries. As the data was not collected from a randomized sample, the survey has no margin of error. — With reporting by Peter Henderson at phenderson@thewirereport.ca and editing by Derek Abma at dabma@thewirereport.ca

Ericsson report finds one-third of consumers polled have or want wearables

Broadcast | March 11, 2015

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