Thursday 31 October 2013
Tuesday 17 September 2013
Inside The 2013 Forbes 400: Facts And Figures On America's Richest
Bill Dates is the richest American for the 20th year in a row and has reclaimed the title of world’s richest person from Mexico’s Carlos Slim with a net worth of $72 billion.Warren Buffett, again number two, was the year’s biggest dollar gainer, having added $12.5 billion to his fortune. Facebook’s hot stock pumped up Mark Zuckerberg’s fortune by $9.6 billion and put him back into the top 20 after missing the top cut last year; Carl Icahn lost his battle to stop Dell DELL +0.14%from going private but he had a great year and moves back in the top 20 for the first time since 2008. The biggest percentage gainer was Workday’s David Duffield, whose fortune more than tripled to $6.4 billion, and just behind him in terms of percentage jumps was the entrepreneur Elon Musk, now worth $6.7 billion and ranked 61st.
Five years after the financial crisis sent the fortunes of many in the U.S. and around the world tumbling, the wealthiest as a group have finally gained back all that they lost. The 400 wealthiest Americans are worth just over $2 trillion, roughly equivalent to the GDP of Russia. That is a gain of $300 billion from a year ago, and more than double a decade ago. The average net worth of list members is a staggering $5 billion, $800 million more than a year ago and also a record. The minimum net worth needed to make the 400 list was $1.3 billion. The last time it was that high was in 2007 and 2008, before property and stock market values began sliding. Because the bar is so high, 61 American billionaires didn’t make the cut.
In Pictures: America’s Richest People
There are 20 newcomers to the list. Among the notables are Michael Rubin, whose online sports merchandise retailer Fanatics, recently attracted venture capital investors at a sky-high valuation; Jeff Sutton, who owns a number of the priciest store fronts on Fifth Avenue and Times Square, and 35-year-old Robert Pera, one of just nine under 40, whose wireless networking gear maker Ubiquiti Networks surged after a strong earnings announcement in August. At the time he tweeted this lyric from a Jay-Z song: “And as for the critics, tell me I don’t get it. Everybody can tell you how to do it, they never did it.”
Only 30 people from last year’s list are poorer than a year ago. Twenty-eight people dropped out of the ranks and six people died, including surround sound pioneer Ray Dolby. Of those 28, only 15 saw their fortunes drop, including T. Boone Pickens, whose costly bets on wind energy lost him his billionaire status, and Manoj Bhargava, whose 5-Hour Energy drink firm has been hit by lawsuits and falling revenues. The rest simply couldn’t keep up with the rising tide. Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder is one of the billionaires who didn’t qualify and, in his case, even with a rise in his fortune, just didn’t have enough to stay in the club.
In Pictures: America’s Richest Women
METHODLOGY
This is the 32nd year of the flagship Forbes 400. Even though we’ve been at it a long time, it is always a challenge. Our reporters dig deep. This year we started with a list of 600 individuals considered strong candidates and then got to work. When possible we met with list candidates in person; we spoke with nearly 100 billionaires this year. We also interviewed their employees, handlers, rivals, peers and attorneys. We pored over thousands of Securities & Exchange Commission documents, court records, probate records, federal financial disclosures and Web and print stories. We took into account all assets: stakes in public and private companies, real estate, art, yachts, planes, ranches, vineyards, jewelry, car collections and more. We also factored in debt. Of course, we don’t pretend to know what is listed on each billionaire’s private balance sheet, although some candidates did provide paperwork to that effect.
Some billionaires who preside over privately held companies were happy to share their financial figures, but others were less forthcoming. A few even threatened to sue. To value these businesses we coupled estimates of revenues or profits with prevailing price-to-revenue or price-to-earnings ratios for similar public companies.
We did not include dispersed family fortunes (like the Du Ponts) when individual net worths were below our minimum. But we did include wealth belonging to a member’s immediate relatives if the wealth could be traced to one living individual; in that case, you’ll see “& family” on our list as an indication.
Our estimates are a snapshot of each list member’s wealth on Aug. 23, when we locked in net worth numbers and rankings. Some of The Forbes 400 will become richer or poorer within weeks—even days—of publication.
Sunday 15 September 2013
Confused About Big Data? Here Are 5 Things You Need To Do
It’s hard to imagine young entrepreneurs these days hoping to find their fortune in resource extraction. The days of wildcat wells have been replaced by an industry of geologists and geopolitics.
Every age has its great opportunity. At the turn of the century, automobiles attracted a flurry of startups. The consumer culture drove the post-war period and, more recently, finance was hot. The killer technology of our time is undeniably big data and building a data science capability is crucial for every enterprise. Here’s what you need to know:
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1. Identify the Opportunity
For people who aren’t in a tech related industry, data science can seem hopelessly far afield. After all, successful executives have gotten that way because they work hard, know their business and serve their customers well. Going to the time, trouble and investment to bring in some eggheaded data scientists just isn’t a priority for most managers.
Yet firms ignore big data at their peril. A broad based study of 179 companies carried out by researchers at MIT and the University of Pennsylvania found that data driven firms performed 5%-6% better. Compounded annually, that’s a decisive advantage. A report by McKinseyfound that the gap could be as high as 60% in the retail sector.
James Manyika, a partner at McKinsey and a chief author of the report, points out that big data capabilities have little to do with company size, IT investment or even the type of business. In fact, he sees some of the biggest opportunities for components suppliers and distributors who generate valuable data through their normal course of business.
2. Build Skills
Gartner predicts that there will be demand for 4.4 million big data jobs by 2015, with 1.9 million of those positions being created in the United States. However, the McKinsey report estimates that there will be a shortage of 140,000-190,000 data scientists and a deficit of 1.5 million managers who are capable of utilizing data driven insights.
The numbers tell a clear story. Just as data skills are becoming crucial to compete in today’s marketplace, big data talent is becoming a scarce resource. Any company without a concerted effort to recruit, train and integrate people with data skills will find themselves at a significant disadvantage.
Fortunately, as demand for talent is growing, so are the resources to meet it. UC Berkeley has launched a fully online Master’s program in data sciencewhich executives can take while they remain at work. IBM IBM +0.75% has partnered with 1000 universities around the world to help meet the skills gap and even offers an open source curriculum for data science programs.
3. Collect Data
Probably the most important thing for managers to do is make data a priority. We’re used to using information for a specific task, such as analyzing quarterly sales numbers together to generate market projections, but thinking about data as a resource in its own right is something relatively new.
McKinsey’s Manyika suggests that we focus on “three P’s”: Proprietary, Public and Purchased data.
Proprietary Data: Many companies are sitting on treasure troves of information, without even knowing it. As noted above, ordinary distributors and components suppliers often generate important data that can be reborn as entirely new businesses. A company called Bounce.io has even figured out how to make a business out of the data from bounced emails.
Public Data: A second important source are public databases that are offered free of charge, such as Data.gov. So someone with proprietary industry data can correlate that information with broader economic trends. These can be used to build a predictive model that can help improve decision making.
Purchased Data: In order to satisfy demand a number of information marketplaces, such as Microsoft’s Windows Azure Marketplace, have sprung up that offer access to valuable resources such as point-of-sale data.
In the digital economy, information is power. So you can’t afford to ignore the resources that are available to you. Once you have data, you can start looking for valuable patterns that can propel your business forward.
4. Unify Your Architecture
We’ve come to expect consistency from the brands we do business with. Go to a major retailer like Bloomingdales or The Gap GPS +0.99% and you’ll see similar brand communication, selection and level of service, no matter which location you find yourself in.
However, that consistency often breaks down between physical and digital brand channels. See something you like on a mobile site as you walk down the street and then enter a store, chances are the brick and mortar staff won’t have the first idea what you’re talking about. Their organizations—and therefore their systems—just aren’t designed that way.
Bobby Emamian, CEO of Prolific Interactive, a mobile strategy and development firm, thinks that much of the problem is due to a historical focus on platforms, rather than functions. Firms build an in-store POS system, then a web site and then a mobile app, all with separate architectures.
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Friday 6 September 2013
Apparently This Matters: Rent a wife?
(CNN) -- Certain products are definitely OK to rent. Like a car. Or a tuxedo. Or the cheapest room at a Motel 6 when you find yourself strolling down I-85 at midnight with no pants.
Things are weird at home.
But a Los Angeles-based company caught the internet's attention this week for renting something completely unexpected: wives.
Yes, the Rent-a-Wife might just be as horribly misogynistic as it sounds. Because it's pretty much what you think it is: a housekeeping and odd jobs service where renters can choose a "wife" from three pricing tiers, ranging from the Starter Wife to the Good Wife to the Trophy Wife.
The company's founder, Juliette Bresnahan, says most of her clients are actually women. So, who the hell knows?
What really matters is that, clearly, if you just surf the Web long enough, you'll find lots of really weird stuff you can rent.
So I did.
Alas, when I started Googling "rent a ..." followed by each letter of the alphabet (minus vowels and X) to see what would autofill, this is what I found:
Rent-a-Bay: A self-service garage in Kent, Washington, Rent-a-Bay is where you can work on your own vehicle with the same professional conveniences of a mechanic. It's a good idea, but there's also a 100% chance I would kill both myself and others in the process of changing a spark plug.
Rent-a-Center: This is a fairly well-known store for rent-to-own furniture and appliances. It's also not a bad rebuilding option for the Phoenix Suns.
Rent-a-Dreads: This one sort of blew me away, for it has nothing to do with leasing a temporary dreadlock weave like the words might suggest. It's actually a term used in regards to female sex tourism. In the Caribbean and Central America, male sex workers are often referred to as Rent-a-Dreads.
In America, a male sex worker is simply known as "Dave with access to Craigslist."
Rent-a-Friend: This site claims to have "Friends from around the world available for hire," perfect for anyone who just needs a buddy. Some of the activities they say people are using Rent-a-Friend for are sporting events, wine tasting and hot air balloon rides.
"Hi. I'm Gary. Would you like to ride in a balloon with me?"
"Hi. I'm Tina. No."
How Entrepreneurs Think Differently and You Should Too
Entrepreneurs are a curious bunch.
They come in all shapes, sizes, genders and backgrounds. They get up at dawn. They're the first ones to the office and the last ones to leave. They use productivity apps, network their tooshes off and leave no stone unturned when it comes to pretty much everything.
At best, they make the rest of us humans wonder if it's worth getting up in the morning. At worst, well, ditto. As superwoman/entrepreneur Ingrid Vanderveldt (Dell's entrepreneur-in-residence, media personality and investor) puts it: "Entrepreneurs are barrier breakers whose optimistic view of the world combined with their creative thinking has the ability to address even the toughest of challenges, including the government's approach to innovation."
Sound crazy? Well, that's the point. Beyond what entrepreneurs actually do, exists a mindset that has them believing even something as morose and archaic as the government is redeemable vis-Ã -vis entrepreneurship.
Beyond the "to do" lists of the most successful ‘treps I know, lies a way of thinking that acts as the engine to their seemingly invincible take on the world. If you think like this, chances are you may be well on your way to doing something insane…like attempting to innovate in the public sector.
Ready? Here's how entrepreneurs (and maybe you?) think:
Ready? Here's how entrepreneurs (and maybe you?) think:
1. You like feeling like a kid.
Entrepreneurs tend to act like kids in a candy store. Nothing is off limits, everything is for the taking, and their inquisitiveness is as infuriating as it is contagious. When I asked Guide's COO, Leslie Bradshaw, to describe how she thinks, and why she prefers the entrepreneurial approach to life, she responded without skipping a beat:
Entrepreneurs tend to act like kids in a candy store. Nothing is off limits, everything is for the taking, and their inquisitiveness is as infuriating as it is contagious. When I asked Guide's COO, Leslie Bradshaw, to describe how she thinks, and why she prefers the entrepreneurial approach to life, she responded without skipping a beat:
"I keep my childlike wonderment alive. I approach the world with curiosity, passion, risk tolerance, and faith -- just like I did when I was growing up. The more traditional companies I worked for out of college not only didn't foster these traits, they flat out discouraged them."
2. You think (or perhaps know?) you can do it better.
Innovation presupposes that whatever came before it is ripe for improvement. For entrepreneurs, this assumption is the driving force behind their efforts. Jeremy Johnson, lifelong entrepreneur and co-founder of 2U, puts it aptly:
"An entrepreneur's train of thought goes like this: ‘everything around me was invented by someone and that person probably isn't any smarter than I am.' We believe almost everything can be improved upon in some way. We start to imagine what could be instead of what is…the world is malleable and many of the rules that exist are more like guidelines."
3. You are typically optimistic.
This may seem like an extremely obvious thing to point out, but its importance simply cannot be overemphasized. Plenty of entrepreneurs exist who have a somewhat negative disposition. But I would argue that those who think this way generally don't get very far.
This may seem like an extremely obvious thing to point out, but its importance simply cannot be overemphasized. Plenty of entrepreneurs exist who have a somewhat negative disposition. But I would argue that those who think this way generally don't get very far.
Two things tend to happen: 1) they earn reputations as terrible bosses and 2) their businesses eventually erode because of their own self-fulfilling, pessimistic prophecy.
Special note: being optimistic is just typically a better way to approach the world, so do it for your own sanity if nothing else.
4. You're a rule breaker.
Entrepreneurs are by nature rule breakers and dissenters. This is an attitude as much as it is a mentality. Meredith Fineman, CEO of FinePoint Digital PR gives an all-too-familiar look at what goes through the mind of an entrepreneur on a regular basis:
Entrepreneurs are by nature rule breakers and dissenters. This is an attitude as much as it is a mentality. Meredith Fineman, CEO of FinePoint Digital PR gives an all-too-familiar look at what goes through the mind of an entrepreneur on a regular basis:
"It's hard for me to relate when people can't wait for the week to be over or can't wait to rush out of the office for Happy Hour. My job is never done, nor do I want it to be. That's not to say that I never do things for pleasure, but I am constructing my own life and not constricting it based on someone else's ideas or standards."
5. You're probably a gear head.
This last point is a direct result of our modern-day reliance on technology as a vehicle for innovation. As Vanderveldt observes:
"Technology has been the common denominator for all the companies I have started -- from data mining to green energy. I believe it is the global equalizer and enabler. Young entrepreneurs and startups need to be focused on (and thinking about) enabling their organization to scale, delivering faster and more efficient results, and maximizing workforce productivity - all of which can be supported through technology."
So whether you're considering getting your feet wet as a first-time entrepreneur, or you are well on your way to entrepreneurial success, keep in mind that how you think is just as important as what you actually do. Thinking like an entrepreneur requires a unique approach to the world and a mindset to help view the world as limitless in its possibilities for improvement, change and, ultimately, innovation.
Read more: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/228136#ixzz2e93N5wVz
7 Things Your Body Language Is Telling Your Boss
Thinking about wearing that red tie to a meeting with the managing director today? You might want to think again.
Body language and nonverbal communication can have a big impact on your professional life and can ultimately make or break a deal, business relationship or even your financial success, according to a legion of body language books.
"In business, one of the most important things is the impression you give people," Eliot Hoppe, an author and expert on body language, told CNBC.
Body language encompasses body movements, facial expressions and gestures as well as the tone of your voice. Here are Hoppe's top tips to optimize your chances of business success.
1) Posture: People make up their minds about others in just the first four seconds, Hoppe said. "In business, you've got to remember that when you walk into a boardroom, people have already made a decision about you by the time you sit down."
To ensure you go into business meetings as equals walk in with a good posture. "Stand upright, have a brisk walk, you want to convey that you want to be there and are confident," Hoppe said. "If you slump your shoulders--what message will that give?"
We all have "fronts" but you have to make that outward appearance of confidence believable--people can see through it easier than you think.
2) Handshake: Touch can be a big part of body language, get it wrong and you can end up with a black eye or dismissal--get it right and you can literally gain the "upper hand" in a business transaction.
"For most parts of the world, a handshake in business is the norm and just from that you can get an idea if the person is being dominant and aggressive or passive," Hoppe said.
One word of warning: Watch out for the "power play" that can take place.
Simple observations such as a limp or firm handshake are easy. Watch out if when shaking someone's hand the other person tries to turn the handshake so that their hand is on top. "This is a power play," Hoppe said. Most handshake power plays are sub-conscious but occasionally you will find that in order to appear submissive someone will willingly give you "the upper hand."
Also watch what the "free" hand does in a handshake. Does the other person use the second hand to shake your hand or to pat your other arm?
"The higher up [your shoulder] the free hand goes, the bigger the power play," Hoppe said.
George Bush and Tony Blair were a classic case of touch power play, for instance. "Who would pat the other's arm higher up or who would enter a door first was always an issue," Hoppe said.
Just one more thing to remember. Don't hold a drink in the hand you use to greet people. "All people will feel is a cold, wet hand," Hoppe said. "That won't give a good impression."
3) Touch: Never touch your face. It conveys deceit, insincerity and mistrust, according to Hoppe, while touching one's lips can indicate a lack of agreement.
"When you see someone touch their face you instantly distrust them or feel uneasy about them."
4) Tonality: The tone of your voice make up a large part of nonverbal communication.
"If you're trying to convince someone of something pay attention to your tonality. When you're making a statement, command or directive, your voice goes down at the end of the sentence. So if you're trying to convince someone of something, make sure it goes down."
Also, watch out: A person who is trying to deceive someone will tend to raise the voice at the end of a sentence--trying to convince either himself or you.
5) Dress: Red and yellow are power colors. Be careful when choosing them. They can either convey confidence or come across as arrogant to your boss.
6) Feeling vulnerable: Look at items such as a your colleague or client's pen or glasses--are they chewed at the ends? How do they hold a book or briefcase? Scrutinizing these behaviors indicates how that person approaches negotiations, as well as his thought processes and business confidence.
"When we feel vulnerable we protect our neck area. When another person feels vulnerable too they will try to protect themselves--holding a book or papers over their chest or touching their neck--these are all self-assurance techniques," Hoppe said.
7) Standing position: If you want to have the best face-to-face rapport with someone, take a small step to your left so that your right eye is directly facing your colleague's right eye. Hoppe said 75 percent of people surveyed feel more comfortable than when standing to someone's right.
Read more: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/228056#ixzz2e91Gi2I735 Questions That Will Change Your Life
“Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers.” – Voltaire
“We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers.” – Carl Sagan
“The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.” – Ayn Rand
As I turn 35 and think of my life so far and what’s to come, I realize how much I’m shaped by the questions I ask. I’ve always been insatiably curious. These are the 35 questions that have made the biggest impact on my life.
Self-Awareness
What are you pretending not to know? This was perhaps the most powerful question I was ever asked (by my best friend @bengleib). All possibilities open up when we stop deceiving ourselves.
Why don’t you do the things you know you should be doing? Life isn’t about figuring out what to do. The real challenge is (not so) simply doing the things we know we should be doing.
What are your values and are you being true to them? Write down the 3 most important aspects of each of these areas: family, romantic relationships, friends, work, health, sex and spirituality. These are your values. When we don’t act congruently with what we value, symptoms of discomfort arise.
In what ways are you being perceived, that you’re not aware of? Perception is reality. Make sure, for better or worse, you know what people really think of you.
What don’t you know, that you don’t know?It’s always the obstacles that we don’t even see coming that are the biggest challenges in life. Get in the habit of asking people that have been there and done it before for guidance.
Happiness / Peace of Mind
Are your “shoulds” getting in the way of your happiness? The desires of our ego are often in conflict with the emotions of our heart. You’ll always have what you want, if you want what you have.
If you achieved all of your life’s goals how would you feel? How can you feel that along the way? The discipline of delayed gratification is one of the most powerful habits of successful individuals. But most actions we take are meant to elicit an emotion in the now. We’re happier striving for our goals when we let ourselves feel that which we want to feel when our outcome is achieved.
What did I learn today? Who did I love? What made me laugh? I try and ask myself these 3 questions at the end of each day. Regardless of anything else that happens, if you learned something new, loved a good person and got to laugh heartily, it was a day worth having and remembering.
Perspective
If you weren’t scared what would you do?Use the rocking chair test. What would your 90-year-old self, looking back on your own life, advise you to do in the moment?
If you were dying, would you worry about this? We so easily lose perspective on what takes up our energy and focus. We’re all dying. Sometimes we need to remind ourselves of this to enjoy living.
Should you be focused on today or tomorrow? Savor the present but don’t forget your future. Life is a balance of knowing when to enjoy the moment vs. when to plant seeds for tomorrow’s harvest.
Influence / Achievement
Why not? What would happen if…? Don’t accept that things just are the way they are. Question why something can’t be done. And when you get pushback to these questions, reframe the negative answers with possibilities.
What/Who did you make better today? The way to measure your worth may just be to give more than you take. Asking what/who you made better each day is a simple litmus test we can all measure ourselves by.
What/Who did you make better today? The way to measure your worth may just be to give more than you take. Asking what/who you made better each day is a simple litmus test we can all measure ourselves by.
What do you want your life to be in 5 years? If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll never get there – Lewis Carroll. Write down 5-year goals. They’re close enough to grasp for, yet far off enough to achieve almost anything.
What can you do today to improve? Consistent, incremental improvement is the secret to achieving the greatest of feats.
Business / Entrepreneurship
What’s your WHY? If you have a big enough WHY you’ll always figure out the What and the How. If you don’t have a BIG WHY, you’ll always use the What and the How as an excuse for not doing that thing you said you were going to do.
What’s the one most important thing to get done today/ this week/month? Write this down on a Post-it note at the beginning of each day/week, and hold yourself accountable for completing this above all other Stuff To Do.
What questions must you consider before starting a business? See my list by watching “The 10 Questions” or reading the document.
What’s the potential upside? What’s the effort involved? What’s the likelihood of success? What’s the strategic value? This is the framework I came up with 3 years ago on “How to Make the Right Business Decisions”. Whenever there is an opportunity cost, I have my team go through this exercise.
What are we talking about? What problem are we solving? I try to start off every meeting by putting this on the whiteboard. In group settings we too often we find ourselves having completely different conversations. Sometimes when answers are difficult to come by, it’s helpful to question if we’re solving for the right problem.
Can you get it done now? If something is important or urgent and you can get it done now, do it.
What do you need to make it happen? This is one of my favorite questions to ask as a manager. It creates ownership to make sure the goals will be achieved. And it creates a shared responsibility to provide the resources required (time, money, talent, etc.) to achieve those goals.
If we could wave a magic wand and do anything together, what would that look like? I use this question all the time with potential business partners. By removing the perceived constraints that bind us and focusing on mutually desired outcomes, we often discover new pathways of possibility.
How would your role models act and carry themselves? Act as if. Act as if you have the experience, wisdom and swagger of your role model, and you’ll often find even the most unchartered of situations more navigable.
When can we meet? We’re often this one question away from engaging with someone who can open up limitless avenues of possibility. The most important aspect of business is still to always get it done in person.
Will you be my mentor? It’s one question that, when asked in earnest, almost nobody will turn down. Reach out to a person in a position and industry you admire, and ask them if you can take them to coffee and hear about how they got there.
What will I only know about you after we’ve worked together for a year? This interview question comes from the awesome Wendy Lea (CEO,GetSatisfaction). This may be the best interview question I’ve ever heard.
What would get you interested in our product/service? Selling is the art of asking good questions, listening, and matching your value to people’s needs. Sales is very easy when others explain what they want and need from you.
Catch-All
What else? Such a simple but powerful question with so may applications.
Now share yours. What are the questions that made the biggest difference in your life? Comments encouraged.
Reference:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonnazar/2013/09/05/35-questions-that-will-change-your-life/
Reference:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonnazar/2013/09/05/35-questions-that-will-change-your-life/
Thursday 5 September 2013
Sony’s SmartWatch 2 Versus Samsung’s Galaxy Gear
Sony’s new smartwatch, which is actually named the SmartWatch 2, has been a known quantity since its official announcement in June at the Mobile Asia Expo in Shanghai, and now the Samsung Galaxy Gear has been itemized by its creators in Berlin at IFA. Meaning it’s time for the two to square off in our blogger arena of champions for a spec and feature showdown.
SONY SMARTWATCH SPECS
- 1.6-inch, 220×176 display
- Aluminum body
- Micro USB charging
- Compatible with most Android phones
- NFC and Bluetooth 3.0 for connectivity
- 3 to 4 days battery under normal use
- €199 ($262 U.S), Ships in late September
- No camera, mic or speakers
SAMSUNG GALAXY GEAR SPECS
- 1.63-inch, 320×320 display
- Stainless steel body
- Snap-on, proprietary USB 3.0 charger
- 800MHz Exynos single-core processor
- Bluetooth 4.0 LE
- Compatible with new Galaxy devices, previous gen Galaxy support coming soon
- Around 1 day of use
- 4GB of onboard storage
- $299
- Ships in September (October for U.S.)
- 1.9 megapixel camera, 720p video recording, speaker + 2 mics
- Gyroscope and accelerometer for workout tracking
The SmartWatch 2 isn’t cheap at €199; in fact, it’s the same price as the newly-reduced 8GB Nexus 4 model. Samsung’s is $299 and much more full-featured, with Samsung managing to pack a whole host of A/V equipment in its device. It also runs a number of Android apps out of the box, which have been redesigned specifically for the watch.
SmartWatch 2 does have NFC for easy pairing with Android devices that support it, as well as more battery life, a better, higher resolution screen, and water/environment resistance that should keep your device protected from general grit and submersion at 3 feet for up to 30 minutes. Sony’s also doing a big push for bringing third-party apps to the SmartWatch software platform, which could help narrow the gap there.
Overall though, as you can see from the list of specs above, there’s not really much of a competition between the two devices in terms of features; but Sony’s SmartWatch 2 has an edge in battery life owing to its much more narrow feature set, and it offers wider support for other Android devices out of the box.
These are two very different definitions of the term “smartwatch,” with the more ambitious vision coming from Samsung. Aside from the steep requirement of apparent (temporary?) platform lock-in, I’m definitely much more intrigued by the Gear, but I also suspect both devices will find a mostly limited receptive audience among consumers.
Wednesday 4 September 2013
Samsung Unveils Galaxy Gear Smartwatch
BERLIN — Samsung Electronics unveiled on Wednesday its highly anticipated digital wristwatch that can snap photos, track workouts and use an array of apps — gadgetry that the company hopes will catapult it into a market of smart portable devices that leave cellphones in users’ pockets.
Named the Samsung Galaxy Gear, the so-called smartwatch will join Google Glass as the latest example of wearable technology. The watch is synced to a cellphone, allowing users to answer calls and receive text messages from their wrists. The timing of the release could also give Samsung a leg up over Apple, which has yet to unveil a similar device but has long been rumored to be working on one.
At a much-hyped unveiling ceremony ahead of Berlin’s Internationale Funkausstellung, one of the world’s largest trade shows for consumer electronics, Samsung’s head of mobile communications, J.K. Shin, introduced the new device by pretending to receive a text message on stage.
“Don’t forget to mention Android,” Mr. Shin’s message read.
He then raised his left arm, exposing the watch to applause from both the Berlin crowd and people in Times Square in New York, who were patched into the event via video stream. Like other smartphones and tablets Samsung produces, Gear runs on Google’s Android operating system.
From the Gear’s small screen, which measures 1.63 inches diagonally, users can also receive e-mails, share pictures and use myriad apps designed for Gear. It does not, however, function as a stand-alone device and must be paired with a Samsung phone or tablet.
Pranav Mistry, the head of research at Samsung Research America, said the watch was “packed with technologies from the next decade.”
The watch has a rubbery wristband in which a small 1.9-megapixel camera is embedded. Its display surface has stainless steel bezels with four visible screws in each corner.
The watch is activated by pressing a button on the outer right side of the display or aiming the wristband lens at an object. A gentle swipe downward quickly turns on the camera, a feature Samsung calls the “Memographer.”
“This is a feature that changes the way we interact, the way we express and the way we capture,” Mr. Mistry said.
From the home screen, swiping upward brings up a number pad where a user can make a call. Because a gyroscope and accelerometer detect the Gear’s movement, a user can answer incoming calls by lifting his wrist to his ear.
“We have uniquely positioned the speakers and microphones so you can talk as you would on a regular phone,” Mr. Mistry said.
The Gear is set to be released worldwide next month, although neither Mr. Shin nor Mr. Mistry gave a date. Also under wraps was the cost, something many believe could be a determining factor in whether the next-generation technology hits home with consumers who have historically been reluctant to adopt such “wearables of tomorrow,” as Mr. Mistry called the Gear.
Samsung, which overtook Apple last year as the world’s largest producer of smartphones, got into the watch business in 1999 with a model that consumers shunned.
Galaxy Gear has 512 megabytes of RAM and an internal memory of four gigabytes. It has an 800-megahertz, single-core central processing unit and weighs 73.8 grams. Available colors include lime green, oatmeal beige, wild orange, mocha gray, jet black and rose gold.
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