July
LG announced KiZON for kids that's essentially a criminal's ankle tag for tiny wrists. Popular fitness app maker Runtastic launch their Orbit wearable and HP announce collaboration with designer Michael Bastian to make the achingly fashionable Chronowing smartwatch.
August
The Sproutling baby tracker is launched. The Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research and Intel trial a wearable that analyses patient data in real time. Google's LIftware spoon, which analyses and counteracts the shakes suffered by Parkinson's patients, provides further potential tech relief.
Ralph Lauren launches "Polo Tech" wearable apparel at the US Open. This collects biometric data during sports activity and is used on this occasion to track the health of some of the bellboys and girls.
September
Adidas' FitSmart goes on sale, Samsung announce their Gear VR virtual reality headset, developed in conjunction with Oculus, the Moto 360 hits shops and Misfit Wearables launch the £50 Flash activity tracker.
In focus: Apple finally "launch" their Watch
The clever "crown" was greeted by the sound of palms meeting faces across all rival smartwatch manufacturers, but commentators were otherwise left nonplussed by the safe design amidst an outpouring of general "what's it for?" ennui.
But no matter, Apple reportedly aim to sell 40 million of these pieces in 2015. What are the chances of that?
Now on the one hand, there are millions of compatible iPhones in circulation to ping notifications to, send your heartbeat to and finger scribble messages with, so that seems like a plausible target.
On the other hand, 40 million eclipses the first year of sales of the iPad by 100%, so that seems like an implausible target. Hmm.
As with smartphones, success for both Watch and its well established Android rivals (not forgetting Pebble) could come down to the apps they carry, with devs in their hundreds currently beavering away on both Watch and Wear software, hoping to conclusively answer the aforementioned, "what's it for?" question. But if the software jockeys don't pull that off, will convenient notifications and step counting alone be enough to secure billions in profits for smartwatch-smiths? We seriously doubt it.
