WEARABLES

Don’t Believe Me Just Watch

Smartwatches shook off a coronavirus sales slump in the first half of 2020. Global device shipments were flat year on year, but revenue grew 20%, according to Counterpoint Research. 

Who led the pack in H1? 

• Pole position: Epic Games’ enemy. Apple captured over 51% of global smartwatch shipment revenues. Watch shipments grew 22% YoY. 
• No. 2: Garmin had 9.4% of H1 revenues. Garmin’s smartwatches are popular with athletes and myself (one of these is not like the other). 
• Bronze: Huawei captured 8.3% of global smartwatch H1 revenues, with a 57% annual leap in shipments. The Huawei GT2 (pictured above) was the third-best-selling smartwatch in H1, after No. 1 Apple Watch Series 5 and No. 2 Series 3. 
• Also ran: Samsung at 7.2%, Imoo at 5.1%, Amazfit, Fitbit at 2.4%, and Fossil at 2.1%. Ten percent of smartwatches are powered by Google’s Wear OS, including Fossil’s wearables. The company is still trying to acquire Fitbit. 

India (+57% YoY), Europe (+9% YoY) and the US (+5% YoY), regions most affected by COVID, “saw a healthy growth in smartwatch shipments, which offset the decline in other markets,” Counterpoint said. Fitbit and Garmin appear to be losing market share, offset by Garmin and Huawei shipments.

Apple dominates “in volume and value”...

...per Counterpoint Senior Analyst SuJeong Lim. Why?

Well, for one, it’s Apple. Watch Series 5 runs on an Apple processor and the software just works. At its 2020 WWDC conference, Apple hyped up the machine learning features onboard the Watch, which can be used to track sleep or handwashing. 

• The Apple Watch has an FDA-cleared ECG app and a full detection feature. Samsung’s new and well-received Galaxy Watch 3 has ECG and blood pressure features that the FDA is currently evaluating.

Zoom out: Scientists around the world are turning smartwatches into infectious disease field researchers. They’re pairing wearables with companion AI software and testing detection capabilities for COVID-like symptoms, the flu, and other illnesses. Keyword is “testing”—researchers are still in the early innings. 

Apple released the first Watch in 2015. In January, a Pew survey found that one in five Americans regularly wear a smartwatch. That’s pretty rapid adoption for the mobile accessory, which continues to ship with new tech features.

SMART CITIES

AI Gets the Green Light (Haha)

Had to get that awful joke off my chest. 

This week, California startup NoTraffic began deploying its traffic grid management software at a few intersections in Phoenix, AZ. The system uses computer vision and connected vehicle technology (V2X) to identify cars, bikes, buses, and skateboarding TikTokers zipping through intersections.

• NoTraffic’s system automatically changes lights based on traffic flows and gives right of way to emergency vehicles. Maybe it’s also talking with all of the city’s self-driving Waymos.

Digital twins: Last week, MicroTraffic launched a grant funding program for its AI tool that predicts the probability of accidents at intersections. Like NoTraffic, the Canadian startup uses both computer vision and camelCase.

MicroTraffic’s software IDs vehicles and pedestrians, calculates their speed and angle, and determines risk. This is the kind of AI problem that you need heaps of training data to solve. No worry: Cameras are a common occurrence at many intersections.

Big picture: Smart cities’ near future probably looks more like the incremental implementation of tools like TheseTrafficCompanies' than high-profile overhauls, like Alphabet's recently disbanded Sidewalk Labs project in Toronto.

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DRONES

Made In the USA

Yesterday the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit gave its blessing to five companies to sell preapproved drones to the military and federal agencies. DJI is not on the list, because Washington considers the Chinese company’s drones a security risk. 

• Skydio’s X2-D. On July 15, I wrote: “Skydio is emerging as the de facto drone rival to China’s DJI by focusing on autonomous software.”
• Parrot’s Anafi USA. French startup Parrot exited the consumer toy drone market last year to focus on enterprise and government flying robots. 
• Altavian’s M440 Ion. By the looks of its website, Altavian is focused on military sales.
• Teal Drones’ Golden Eagle. Ibid. 
• Vantage Robotics’ Vesper. I’m a broken record: Ibid. 

Competitive context: Hardware is hard—and the business model is harder in the U.S. DJI's hardware excellence and lower production costs have propelled it past American competitors in the consumer space. Many American drone startups have pivoted to services and software. 

What I’m wondering: Will creating a stronger domestic government market generate positive spillovers in the consumer space? Or will specific American companies supply drones to the U.S. government and Fortune 500 companies—while DJI rules the consumer roost?

BITS & BYTES

Stat: Nvidia is a $300 billion chipmaker, which Intel hasn’t achieved since the dot-come era. In quarterly earnings this week, Nvidia said its data center business eclipsed its gaming business for the first time. 

Quote: “In the absence of federal oversight, the dominant digital platforms have become governments unto themselves with the ability to impose their own set of rules on economic activities and consumer choices.”—Tom Wheeler, Phil Verveer, and Gene Kimmelman. The former government officials propose the establishment of a new Digital Platform Agency.

Listen: A speech synthesizer sings “Fireworks” by Katy Perry and it’s...interesting. Thanks to Brew growth maven Tony for showing me this.

WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

• Apple acquired Israeli AR and computer vision startup Camerai a year and a half ago for “several tens of millions of dollars,” Ctech reports. 
• Mark Zuckeberg testified before the Federal Trade Commission this week, as part of the agency's antitrust probe. 
• News publishers are asking Apple for more favorable App Store revshare policies, the WSJ reports.
• Google’s Pixel Buds are getting a new transcribe mode that translates longer speeches. 
• Germany is testing universal basic income with 120 citizens. 
• Taiwan is tightening restrictions on foreign direct investment from China, as a means of reducing tech transfer to the mainland.
• BlockFi, a crypto lending and borrowing startup, raised a $50 million Series C. It raised a Series A last August...

GOING PHISHING

Three of the following news stories are true, and one...I made up. Can you spot the odd one out?

1. A bald eagle took down a Michigan government DJI drone on a coastline erosion monitoring mission. 
2. Cisco is in the running to buy TikTok. 
3. Elon Musk says Tesla Full-Self Driving is ready to make a “quantum leap” and that a big update is 6-10 weeks away.
4. The Florida Keys will release over 750 million genetically modified mosquitoes over the next two years.

TECH THINGAMABOBS

For exploring the world: The drive and listen web app shows you the feed of a car driving through a couple dozen global cities with local radio stations playing. Give it a second to load. I spent Wednesday listening to unintelligible Russian and “driving” around St. Petersburg. 

For a non-tech documentary: Akashinga: The Brave Ones profiles the Zimbabwean female rangers who protect key species against poaching and extinction. James Cameron was an executive producer for the documentary. Check it out. 

Thanks to readers Andrew M. and Thivanka D. S. for flagging today’s thingamabobs for me. If you have interesting, non-self-promotional suggestions for this section, send them my way. 

ICYMI

Catch up on the top Emerging Tech Brew stories from the past few editions: 

• SpaceX launches 11th batch of Starlink satellites
• EVs and SPACs
• Microsoft releases new flight simulator

GOING PHISHING ANSWER

To my knowledge, Cisco is not in the running to buy TikTok.