-Hey, everyone.
Welcome to the Inside Scoop.
I'm CNET's Kara Tsuboi joined by Senior Writer, Josh Lowensohn.
And today, we're talking about the category of smartwatches.
Last night, Samsung revealed that they actually are working on a SmartWatch product, which is--
-This is crazy.
-That they would reveal so much, right?
-Yeah.
I mean, this is a product that does not exist yet and they say, hey, guess what, we're working on one.
-Yeah.
Guess what competition.
-The other funny thing is it's 2013 and we're talking about watches being cool
again.
How did this happen?
-Right.
Who even wears a watch?
Oh, that's kind of a watch.
-My kids do.
That's why.
-Right, because a combination of a watch and a fitness band, which a lot of people are doing.
-Yeah.
So, the big rumor here is that this would be possibly a companion device.
Something you'd have if you already have a smartphone.
Something that could connect to the internet but wouldn't need all that equipment on it, you know, it uses your smartphone.
We've already seen products of different companies like Pebble, obviously this ties into products, it ties into your smartphone, using that
same data and sync over data.
-Samsung, however, has built smartwatches in the past.
They haven't been available here in the U.S. and they've been really expensive.
-Yes.
So, these were $600, $700 devices in Europe really since 1999, in 2009, and those are really just kind of like this weird amalgam of like smartwatch and cellphone in one and it didn't work because it's too expensive.
It wasn't a great watch, it wasn't a great smartphone and it was too expensive and people just didn't buy them.
-Right.
So, what do you think makes them think they can do it this time?
I guess like what you said,
slimming it down, stripping it down a bit.
-Yeah and I think Samsung has also learned a lot about what people want, I mean, from their products.
They kind of have this tendency to throw out a lot of stuff and see what sticks.
And we saw that with the Galaxy Note, you know, this is the first phone like in recent years with a stylus, so it's really done well, you know, like--
-Yeah.
-Like it's kind of rebirth that idea that came from the Palm Pilot.
-So, we can't talk about watch wars without talking about some of the Apple rumors that Apple perhaps is designing their own watch and these are just rumors, right?
-Yeah.
I mean, the basic ideas that there are hundred people somewhere working
at Apple presumably that some are the same folks that are working at iOS and what we have in the iPhone and the iPad, creating some wearable technology.
You know, whether it's a watch or some sort of armband, you know, we're not really sure yet but the whole idea is to really expand that ecosystem from MP3 players, tablets, and smartphones.
I mean, there's so much room for breath there.
-Yeah.
-At least that's what analysts think, if there's like billions left span.
-Oh, all right.
We'll see.
Watch war just heating up.
Thank you so much Senior Writer, Josh Lowensohn.
I'm Kara Tsuboi.
Thanks for watching the Inside Scoop.
