The smart wrist market has entered the "Three Kingdoms Killing" pattern! Huawei, Apple Roll Health Monitoring

Electronic enthusiast network reported (text/Mo Tingting) In Q2 of this year, the global wrist wearable device market and the Chinese wrist wearable device market have different development trends. From a global perspective, the global wrist wearable device market shipments in Q2 were 43.74 million units, a year-on-year decrease of 0.7%. The Chinese market showed a strong growth trend, with shipments reaching 15.55 million units, a year-on-year increase of 10.9%, outpacing the global market. Huawei, Xiaomi, and Apple have become the top three in the global market, opening a new pattern of global smart wrist wearable devices.

In the context of increasingly fierce competition, wrist wearable device brand manufacturers are becoming more and more "volume", which is mainly reflected in the two main directions of technology and price, in addition, in order to gain more market share, domestic brand enterprises are also continuing to deepen the layout of going overseas, and there have been changes in market strategy.

The global smart wristwear market has entered the "Three Kingdoms Killing" pattern

Thanks to the measures of Chinese manufacturers in various aspects such as technology iteration, product innovation, market expansion and price strategy, China's wearable device market has ushered in the performance of its debut at the beginning of Q1 this year, and the year-on-year growth rate of China's wearable market is 4 times that of the global market, and wrist wearable devices such as smart watches and smart bracelets have achieved year-on-year growth.

As the Chinese market shows strong growth, the global wrist wearable device market landscape has also changed.

In Q2 2023, the top three in the world are Apple, Huawei, and Xiaomi, followed by Samsung and BBK. In Q2 of this year, Huawei jumped to the first place, surpassing Apple, Xiaomi ranked second, and Apple ranked third. These three are also brands that have achieved a market share of more than 10%. At this point, the global wrist wearable device market has officially entered the "Three Kingdoms Killing" pattern.

Smart wrist wearables can be divided into basic bracelets, basic watches, and smart watches, and Huawei, Xiaomi, and Apple have their own advantages in these three categories. Although the data of various research institutions are not consistent, they almost all have the same conclusion: in the field of basic bracelets, Xiaomi is more ahead, Huawei's shipments of basic watches are higher, and Apple occupies nearly half of the smart watch field.

From the Q2 global wrist wearable device shipment data given by the market research agency Canalys, it can be seen that the shipments of Xiaomi basic bracelets account for 40% of the global market, and the shipments of Huawei basic watches account for 15% of the global market, and smart watch products are still Apple's core market segment, accounting for 49% of shipments in the global market.

The position of these three manufacturers in the market and the significance they brought to the wristwear market when they first entered the market are not the same.

After the release of the Apple Watch, Apple became the first manufacturer to add smart functions such as payment to smart watches, and then centered on health monitoring functions, which led to the development of the smart wrist wearable device market, and also made the concept of health monitoring popular in the smart watch industry.

In February 2014, Huawei released its first wearable product, the TalkBand B1, which is the industry's first wearable device that integrates the functions of Bluetooth headsets with sports and sleep monitoring. When the product was released, it caused controversy in the industry. Today, Huawei has become a mainstream player in the field of wearable devices. Huawei has been the No. 1 seller in China's wristwearable device market in terms of shipments since 2021, and this time it has jumped to the first place in the world, thanks to the layout of overseas markets. Huawei has opened up markets in the Middle East and Africa, Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe, and in September, Huawei held a press conference in Barcelona to release a new generation of smart watches for overseas markets.

In 2019, Xiaomi entered the game and released Xiaomi Watch, which opened another curtain of competition in the smart wrist wearable device market, and further increased the market penetration rate of smart watches and smart bracelets with cost-effective advantages. However, its main advantage is still in the smart bracelet market, how to enhance the competitive advantage of the smart bracelet market, and at the same time expand the market share of smart watches, is the key to its next development.

Of course, the competitive pattern of "Three Kingdoms" does not mean that Huawei, Xiaomi, and Apple have no other competitors, and Samsung, which ranks fourth, also has a place in the smart wrist wearable device market. Recently, Samsung announced that the Galaxy Watch 5 smartwatch was "used to monitor astronauts' body composition", which also demonstrates the advanced and reliable health monitoring technology of Samsung smartwatches. In the next development, it is worth looking forward to whether Samsung has the opportunity to turn the tables against the wind.

How should a smart watch be "rolled"? Health monitoring becomes the goal

Nowadays, the global smart wrist market has entered a new stage of development, what are the innovative directions on the technology side that can enhance the competitive advantage of manufacturers?

In terms of technology iteration, brands are "rolling" health monitoring. Over the past decade, Huawei has released products such as static heart rate monitoring technology, wrist ECG and blood pressure recorders, and launched ECG collection functions, deepening health monitoring capabilities through continuous R&D investment. In August this year, Huawei unveiled the HUAWEI TruSense System.

What are the main problems that the Xuanji perception system solves? Traditional sensors use single-point detection technology, which cannot achieve long-term continuous and accurate monitoring. Zhang Wei, President of Huawei's Health Product Line, said that the new TruSense sensing system integrates single-point monitoring technology into a multi-dimensional sensing system upgrade, ushering in a leapfrog upgrade of health monitoring.

Through the use of new super-sensing modules and algorithms, multi-channel optical path architecture, ultra-light-insulating glass technology and other technical iterations, Xuanji perception system can monitor blood pressure, blood oxygen, heart rate, respiration rate, body temperature and other five basic vital signs. Thanks to the blessing of the super perception module and algorithm, the blood oxygen measurement can be measured in 15 seconds. Zhang Wei introduced that the Xuanji perception system has created a comprehensive sign monitoring system, which can achieve more than 60 detection indicators.

The author believes that the launch of Huawei's Xuanji perception system means that smart wrist wearables are moving towards "active health" in terms of health monitoring, and also enhances Huawei's competitiveness in the field of smart wearables. Zhang Wei said that Xuanji is Huawei's core technology brand for the future of sports and health.

Innovation is Apple's core competitive advantage, but at the moment, Apple seems to be under pressure from the rise of other brands in the Chinese market and the India market. This year's Q2 shipments are less than Xiaomi's, and it can only rank third. How can Apple enhance its competitive advantage in the smart wrist wearable market?

Judging from every new product release in recent years, the innovation of Apple's smart watch mainly comes from processor chips, sensors, display screens, etc. In terms of processor chips, from the S1 chip to the newly released Series 10, it is equipped with the S10 SiP chip and has a built-in 4-core neural engine, which improves the smart functions of the smart watch, and makes the operation more smooth, and the experience of machine learning tasks is better, so that monitoring scenarios such as fall detection have better perception capabilities.

By being equipped with more advanced sensors, Apple's smart wrist wearable devices are constantly updated in sports and health monitoring functions, and Apple upgraded the waterproof function and GPS positioning function as early as the Series 2, which makes the Series 2 have a swimming monitoring function, and also allows the smart watch to no longer rely on smartphones to provide positioning, improving the independence of the smart watch. The true health monitoring features are the Series 4's ECG and fall detection functions. Now, the Series 10 has added a new feature for sleep apnea detection. Apple is trying to add more exclusive features to the smartwatch, such as car crash detection, which supports two-finger interpoint function.

It can be seen from the technical direction of Apple and Huawei,These two manufacturers are taking different technical routes,Huawei has released a new technology brand to make smart watches no longer an independent health measurement product,But a constantly upgrading health management platform。 More than 150 medical research institutions have cooperated with Huawei to promote innovative research in telemedicine. Apple is upgrading day after day, constantly improving hardware functions to make smartwatch devices more powerful.

The improvement of AI and interactive experience brings new opportunities

In addition to the upgrade of health monitoring functions, brand manufacturers are enriching the interactive experience and promoting the application of generative AI on smart watches.

In order to win more markets, Apple is exploring interactive innovations. According to Apple's published patent information, Apple hopes to use UWB to detect natural gestures to achieve smart shopping and information collection by adding UWB technology to smart watches, so as to facilitate smart shopping and other contactless experiences. Apple has applied UWB technology to the iPhone and AirPods Pro 2, and it is worth looking forward to what new application points will be on the smartwatch.

Regarding generative AI, the industry generally believes that smart watches will be one of the categories with the fastest implementation of AI technology. First, it is reflected in the demand for voice interaction and other interactive methods. Second, AI technology can assist smart watches to improve the accuracy of sports monitoring data and sign monitoring data analysis. Third, functions such as positioning are also more accurate after obtaining the blessing of AI technology, which will greatly expand the market of smart watches in the field of children and the elderly.