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Screenshot by Lance Whitney/CNET
Pebble will have something new to announce in another few days. We just don’t know what.
The smartwatch maker’s home page is presently displaying a timer counting down the days, hours, minutes and seconds until presumably something will happen. You can type your email and click an icon labeled “Curious?” But in response, the company simply says: “I bet you are. We’ll keep you posted.”
Pebble has won over a healthy number of customers for its smartwatch lineup, which includes the standard $99 Pebble watch and the $199 Pebble Steel . Earlier this month, the company announced that it had shipped 1 million of its smartwatches since the first one debuted in 2013.
Demand for Pebble watches has been high since its record-setting Kickstarter campaign in 2012. But the company now faces greater competition than it did a couple of years ago. Motorola, Samsung, LG, and Sony have introduced smartwatches equipped with Android Wear, Google’s mobile OS for such products. Microsoft launched its Band watch late last year. And possibly most damaging: Apple will debut its smartwatch in April.
To meet the challenges from rival devices, CEO Eric Migicovsky recently told The Verge that the company will introduce new devices this year and a new software platform. Migicovsky asserted that the new software platform will make its watches more distinct from rival devices. Earlier this week, Pebble announced that its watches are now integrated with Android Wear, including notifications.
So, what might the company have in store once the countdown reaches zero? Well, it could be a brand new smartwatch. However, Migicovsky told CNET last week that the next Pebble and its software will be unveiled later this year. So that option seems to be off the table.
It could be another price cut or new features for its existing lineup. Last September, Pebble trimmed the price of its standard smartwatch to $99 and its Steel edition to $199 and added features to both. Or, of course, it could be something totally out of the blue.
(Via The Next Web)
