We caught up Sunday with Laurent LePen, the CEO of Omate, at Mobile World Congress. He was showing off the first production models of the million-dollar
Kickstarter project TrueSmart watch.
Omate raised a million dollars for the TrueSmart on KickStarter, and the plan is to ship within a couple of months. The watch looks pretty chunky, about the size of one of those old iPod nano watches, only thicker and with buttons along the edges. What makes the TrueSmart watch interesting is that it’s not a notification device; it’s a stand-alone Android device with its own GPS and SIM card. It can carry up to 8GB of memory, expandable by microSD.
What you don’t get from the specs and comparisons is that the TrueSmart is really quite lovely, even given its size. The screen is bright and the responsive to touch. It claims a battery life of 100 hours, a neat trick with a GSM radio. There’s a spec comparison (PDF) here; it doesn’t include the new Samsung Gear 2, but it’s pretty instructive.
This is one of the first pieces of independent wristwear we’re interested in wearing. We’ll see how well its lead holds up as other products hit the market. Prices start at $249. Pre-orders are shipping now or in the next week; new orders will ship when available.
