W|W: The Wearable Weekly – A Love Supreme

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.

Industry Highlights

One small chip from IBM could mean a big leap for IoT and wearables. IBM announced this week that they have successfully been able to produce computer chips just 7 nanometers wide. The chip was developed using a new process which uses Silicon Germanium for the transistors and extreme ultraviolet lithography to etch chips.

Three times a charm? Jawbone has filed another complaint against Fitbit, making it the third time it has sued the fitness wearable rival in a period of two months. Jawbone is arguing that Fitbit poached employees from its company to steal trade secrets. 

Could the Apple Watch help you find love? T3 agency released a concept video for a Tinder Apple Watch app which confirms a match based on your heart rate. The app is good example of what developers are able to do with watchOS 2 which is Apple’s first software update for the Apple Watch which gives developers access to the sensors of the device.

Statistics & Forecasts

Apple sales in the U.S. have fallen by 90 percent since the device launched in April says a new report from Slice Intelligence (CNBC)

Nine per cent of U.S. broadband households plan to buy a smartwatch in 2015 says Parks Associates report (VentureBeat)

40% of smartwatch shoppers plan to spend $100-$250 on a device, with over 60% of these consumers planning to use this wearable for fitness applications says Parks Associates (Sys-con)

Device Announcements

GoPro launched the Hero4 Session its smallest and lightest camera yet (MobileSyrup)

Alcatel OneTouch Watch now available in white (MobileSyrup)

Funding, Crowdfunding, and M&A

FOVE virtual reality headset with eye-tracking successfully completed its crowdfunding campaign raising over $480,000 (Kickstarter)

Audio Wearable Startup Doppler Labs Raises $17 Million (Forbes)

Toronto-based startup Onyx Motion launched an Indigegogo campaign for its basketball smartwatch app Swish (Indiegogo)

Major Milestones

Withings Activité smartwatch now supports automatic swim tracking (MobileSyrup)

FOVE VR headset introduces new industrial design (Road to VR)

Hook, an app that pushes notifications for anything, launched an Apple Watch app (MobileSyrup)

Dominos Pizza launched an Apple Watch app (Forbes)

Apple seeded its third beta of watchOS 2 for Apple Watch (MacRumors)

Rumours

Google patent suggests you might be able to frame a pic with your fingers to take it with Google Glass (Quartz)