Wearable wireless: technology, solutions, vendors, markets and forecast 2014 – 2019

Wearable technology presents the potential for massive transformation in many industries. The more obvious ones include consumer electronics and communications. Early adopter industries include clothing, healthcare, sports and fitness. However, we see many industries adopting wearable technologies as computing and wireless communications integrate wearable into virtually every aspect of products and services.

Wearable technology today represents an array of products including watches, wristbands, and various clothing items. There is not yet a clear winner, nor do we believe there is a need for one. However, our analysis does point towards winners in certain key battlegrounds such as smartwatch vs. smart wristband. Wearable technology will evolve beyond its current ecosystem, which is very dependent on smartphone integration. New business models will develop that place wearable tech at the center of communications, applications, content, and commerce without the need for handheld devices of any type.

Certain market segments are expected to be the leaders and those industry verticals will drive the innovation that will ultimately drive adoption and new market opportunities across a broader universe of industries. Leading areas include Advertising, Clothing, Sports/Fitness, and Healthcare.

Advertising: The emerging wearable technology ecosystem will bring mobile advertising personalization to a whole new level as solutions such as Disney's MyMagic+ wearable are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. We see wearable tech bringing to the fore an entirely new category of mobile advertising that will transform the joking about the movie Minority Report into a viable business model with positive ROI for advertisers.

Clothing: With the introduction of the new wearable devices, a once curiosity area for early adopters is rapidly evolving into a new accessory market where form and function are equally important. The convergence of digital technology and apparel represents a huge opportunity as the telecom, electronics, clothing, and accessories industries cooperate to bring wearable technology to the consumer in a very personal way.

Sports and Fitness: Wearable technology and the sports/fitness market are made for each other. Technology to track and provide feedback for various activities is at the core of wearable tech in this area, but solutions are expected to go far beyond as the technology becomes an integral part of training for professionals and exercise for the general consumer segment.

Healthcare: The overall healthcare market is expected to grow rapidly for wearables with some very specific scenarios and applications expected to excel in particular within the medical area. Wearable technology will be particularly disintermediating for certain existing healthcare solutions that are static an inflexible compared to what is expected to evolve as the healthcare and ICT industries merge in this segment.

Source: PR Newswire; Image via Google Images