Sony has recently admitted to launching a campaign on the Japanese crowdfunding site Makuake in September. The goal was to test out the value of their new product, the FES Watch, which is an electronic paper watch that changes its appearance when the wearer moves it. This is the first in a line of different electronic fashion accessories that a new team under Sony’s umbrella has already begun developing. Other items include customizable glasses, bowties, shoes, etc.
With the new e-paper watch, Sony is hoping to differentiate from other bulkier wearable gadgets that are currently on the market and have yet to be widely adopted. The project has raised approximately 3.5 million yen ($30,000). FES Watch is being worked on by a new division of Sony, called Fashion Entertainments, which is part of their New Business Creation Department. According to an article on The Verge, these are not the only steps that Sony has been taking in an effort to try to recover from falling TV and smartphone sales over the past few years:
“Sony’s startup-style Seed Acceleration Program, announced earlier in the year, allows employees to pitch ideas to people either inside or outside the company with the goal of receiving funding. According to an internal document seen by Bloomberg, Sony received 187 applications during the first round in June, and 80 advanced to the next stage.”
Right now Sony is testing the waters to see if there would be enough demand for less technology-centered wearable electronic products designed with style in mind. One of the benefits of this focus in this case is that it gives the watch an estimated 60 day battery life. So far the company has been keeping the project on the down-low and has not yet announced a release date, although backers of the crowdfunding campaign should be receiving theirs in the summer of 2015.
A BBC article said:
“The watch face and straps have an e-paper display – comparable to the technology used in e-book readers such as Amazon’s Kindle … It means the watch can alternate between several different styles of watch face and strap design.”
Bloomberg posted about Sony’s development of e-paper watches before the connection was made to the FES Watch campaign, having attained documents from a source from within the company who wished to remain anonymous. The article notes that:
“At stake is more than a win against Apple and Samsung Electronics Co. A decade of cost reductions and job cuts has soured Sony’s culture of innovation, once celebrated for the Walkman and the Trinitron television.”
Clearly Sony is trying to turn the tables by opening up to employee ideas and funding promising venture projects; the FES Watch is just one of the first of these initiatives. The company is currently willing to cut poor performing products like TVs and smartphones from their business. Right now they are looking at how they can use e-paper in a way that hasn’t been done before by taking advantage of the material’s thinness to create watches that more people will actually want to wear.
