Apple has said to expect new product categories this year, and many people think the most likely candidate will be an iWatch. Rumors out of China on Tuesday, reported on AppleInsider, say that the iWatch will be coming the third quarter of 2014, with Taiwan's Quanta Computer expected to make 65 million units in the first year. That's a huge number. The source of the report, China Daily News, says that the manufacturers for the components have now been finalized and that things are set to go. In line with other rumors, the glass on the display will be made of sapphire crystal, according to the source.
The iWatch is expected to have a focus on health and fitness commensurate with the expected Healthbook app in the forthcoming iOS 8. It's a matter of fact that Apple has taken a strong direction toward health and fitness applications, given what's known about the experts they've hired over the past year and other tidbits, such as a meeting between key executives and top FDA officials.
A separate rumor reported Monday by AppleInsider cites a claim by a market analyst for Barclays that the iWatch will include UV exposure sensors. What a great idea. If you're going to be out in the sun, what better application of a health-monitoring iWatch than an alert to let you know that you've had enough exposure for one day? The report says that this function would be accomplished through the use of specialized chips developed by Silicon Labs and announced in February. In addition to UV sensing, the report says the chip is capable of helping to measure "heart rate, pulse, blood oximetry, and provide proximity and gesture control sensing using both infrared and ambient light methods." If this rumor isn't accurate and Apple doesn't use this particular chip, at the very least it shows how far advanced tiny sensing chips have become— nd suggests that Apple would likely put this capability into their iWatch.
The analyst estimates that Apple could sell 10 million iWatches by the end of the year. Since that would cover a period of 3-to-6 months, that estimate appears to be a lower figure than the 65 million over 12 months that Apple is expected to have manufactured, according to China News Daily.
It will be interesting to see what happens. If indeed the supply chain for the device is in place, then we're at the stage of the rumor cycle where we'll start getting more reports and also photos of parts.