Speaker 1: Google Samsung and Fitbit. Could they be combining to create the ultimate Android watch soon? That sounds like an impossible dream team proposition. And yet at this year's Google IO developer conference, Google announced partnerships that sound like they're very much headed in that direction. Let's bring. Speaker 1: So Google announced, [00:00:30] first of all, a lot of stuff involving where OS where OS is, Google's watch OS for Android, that you may not be wearing because it really hasn't taken the world. I storm over the last bunch of years, picking a watch for Android has become difficult, whereas apple has the apple watch and it seems very straightforward. There are a lot of options on Android and Google's wear OS, which was meant to be the main way to go. Doesn't feel like the main option Samsung has had its pretty great galaxy watches [00:01:00] for years and a people of optic for those. Instead of Googles, similarly, there are dedicated fitness watches like Fitbit or Garin. Now Google acquired Fitbit. And now Google is explaining how Fitbit is going to start working its way into that watch ecosystem. So Samsung is part of the picture too, and that's where it gets really interesting. So Samsung and Google announced a partnership. And from this point forward, Samsung's watches are going to be running [00:01:30] a combination of an OS blending ties in and Google wear OS. So that means that the next Samsung galaxy watch is going to be one of those watches. Speaker 1: So I spoke with Google's head of wear as well as people from Samsung and Fitbit and got the whole picture as to what's going on. And yes, the two are coming up with a new operating system feel that's going to blend a lot of the wear [00:02:00] west stuff with a lot of what Samsung has been doing on it's watches to create something that's more dynamic and works on higher end devices. That's the interesting part because it suggests that they maybe a focus on getting towards more premium, smart watches to keep up with where the apple watch is. The Samsung has already been step by step with apple watch, but software wise has not been part of the Google wear OS picture. Now it sounds like Google's ready to bring a lot of those things, including maps and Google [00:02:30] assistant, along with some things like Samsung's watch face designing feature, uh, blended together in some sort of a, not just a Samsung watch, but a, uh, a variety of watches that other manufacturers are going to start making, uh, as soon as this fall. Speaker 1: So does that mean that you should wait to get an Android compatible watch? Yeah, absolutely. I would. Uh, because also Samsung said that this wears, uh, move is going to be coming to future Samsung watches, but not to previous Samsung [00:03:00] watches. So at this moment I would hold off on getting a Samsung galaxy watch and wait to see what's coming next, but it does sound incredibly promising. It's going to be running Google play as the software ecosystem. We don't know yet if Samsung's existing app ecosystem will make the move over or whether maybe there'll be the best of certain apps that will make the move. And even Google's existing play ecosystem may have certain apps that are cherry picked to make the move. I don't know if it's going to be a seamless transition. We're still trying to learn a lot of what this [00:03:30] is about. Speaker 1: And Google has not entirely laid that out yet, but it does seem that if you have something and say Samsung S health, you'll be able to X support that data and bring it over to Google's fit ecosystem and use the data there. Now let's talk about Fitbit. Fitbit is part of Google. Now Fitbit just launched a new tracker called the Luxe. Last year. Fitbit had a sensor filled watch called the Fitbit since and Fitbit has never really had a watch. That is a, at all the [00:04:00] features of things like Samsung galaxy or the apple watch in terms of, you know, the whole full phone call, uh, GPS connected, uh, music playing like some of those elements had been there, but not as fluid, but there will be a Fitbit watch running wear west at some point in the future, but doesn't look bag. It's going to be this year. Speaker 1: That watch will probably be a premium thing that will be above what the existing Fitbit watches are. Now. Should you get a Fitbit now that's a little bit different because [00:04:30] Fitbit's slowly introducing its features into wears apparently over the next year or so, starting with a Fitbit app that will, reun like a tile in wear OS probably towards the fall, but that app won't have all of the Fitbit features. It's going to have some things like your today breakdown and some reminders to move, but not necessarily all the stuff for heart rate and sleep. That's still being worked out according to Fitbit. So if you really want that full Fitbit [00:05:00] exp on a watch, and for me, a lot of what Fitbit brings to the table is about heart rate and sleep. You'd still want to get a Fitbit tracker at least for a while, but it is interesting that down the road, you might end up having a device that contains all a Fitbit in a wears watch. Speaker 1: Yes, that means a Samsung wears watch could have a Fitbit app running on it. And over time that Fitbit app might get more advanced. So you could have Samsung, Google, Fitbit, [00:05:30] all living on this advanced watch and that might take, uh, a year or two to really get there. And who knows if it'll it'll really fully get there. Sometimes tech partnerships don't necessarily play out the way you expect and Google does change, track quite a bit on some of its initiatives for new technologies. It sounds extremely promising. And for all these years that I've been covering wearable tech. And I remember looking at the Samsung watch that launched on wears or Android [00:06:00] wear, which was called the Samsung gear live back in 2014. Uh, you know, Samsung had a partnership with them going way back and, you know, you saw wearable tech drifting and what type of a watch, uh, you'd want to get kept fluctuating. Speaker 1: And there doesn't feel like there's been much of a settling on the Android front. This may enable future watches to finally lock down a little bit more with Android. Google's already promising that this move to work with Samsung and [00:06:30] to build more advanced watches should result in having more carrier support and LTE for watches, uh, more support for Google pay on the watches. And so it looks like they're trying to really catch up and make this thing work in a very reliable way, the way you would expect in the same way with Android on phones, hopefully that all comes to pass. And I think it really will help catch up on a real lacking feature in wheres watches, which has been health. Uh, a lot of the bleeding edge [00:07:00] health features, especially the ones that have gotten FDA clearance have been coming from companies like Fitbit, Samsung, and apple. Speaker 1: Now Samsung and Fitbit have been coming to the picture to work with Google. And I would think that that's going to accelerate some of those wearable health tech possibilities on where watches and Google says that they're trying to work out where they're going with health tech to absorb some of the learnings from Samsung and Fitbit, but fit Google fit and Fitbit. A lot of fits here [00:07:30] are not going to be merging yet. They're going to exist as separate apps. And there's no indication yet of when those two will allow it a flow between that's still going to be the case, even with this partnership, as far as we know. So I hope that explained a little bit of what's going on with Samsung, Google, Fitbit, and the future of whatever watch you might be wearing on your wrist for Android. On one final note, I have no idea if any of this stuff is going to work with iOS. Google [00:08:00] has not indicated that yet.