Apple Watch Predicted to Account for 40% of Luxury Market by 2020

BI Intelligence has published a report on the popularity of wearable technology and predicts the Apple Watch will account for 40% of luxury timepieces by 2020. To clarify, the term “luxury” refers to any watch priced $350 or above which includes fairly mass-produced pieces such as the Apple Sport Watch. This could explain why the predicted figures are so high. According to the report:

“Assuming a lower-bound price of $350 for the luxury-watch category, and including Apple Watch in that category, traditional wristwatches would account for ~60% of total shipments in 2020, while Apple Watch would account for ~40%.”

The Apple Watch is an extremely polarizing device with a rather hefty price tag. Honestly, I’m astounded to see consumers opt for an Apple Watch instead of a hand-made Swiss or Japanese timepiece. Mechanical watches are a timeless and dependable piece of machinery and cannot become obsolete due to software. Additionally, the Apple Watch requires daily charging which makes it quite inconvenient. Nevertheless, wearable technology is on the rise, especially in the fashion or fitness sector. I’m still quite skeptical about these claims though as some watches can cost $50,000 which makes the $350 baseline seem quite unrealistic.

I’m intrigued to hear how many people actually use a watch as consumers often rely on their mobile phone to glance at the time.

Thank you 9to5Mac for providing us with this information.