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What does Google get out of buying Fossil’s smartwatch tech?
Yesterday, Google announced that it would be paying $40 million for intellectual property related to smartwatches from one of its closest partners: Fossil Group. As part of the deal, a portion of Fossil's own R&D workers who were supporting that IP will join Google. To be clear, this isn't a merger, nor is Google buying all of Fossil's smartwatch business. It's just a specific piece or pieces of tech that Fossil had been working on. But it begs the question, what exactly did Fossil have that Google didn't and wanted to pay that much money for?
Fossil gets active with Sport smartwatch
American watchmaker Fossil has a new smartwatch that it's adding to its extensive lineup of wearables: the Fossil Sport. The watch, which is targeted at folks with an active lifestyle, is powered by the brand new Snapdragon 3100 platform and runs the recently overhauled Wear OS by Google.
Skagen's new smartwatch might be The One
It felt like I had found my match on smartwatch Tinder. I hadn't even seen the Skagen Falster 2 in person before today, but I was already enthralled by the pictures. The stunning watch teases with its clean, minimalist design, and then grabs you by your eyeballs with its metallic accents and magnetic mesh band. After meeting it at last here at IFA 2018, I think I'm in lust. Just look at this thing.
Google's Wear OS no longer feels like Android on a smartwatch
Google is ready to unveil a shiny new version of Wear OS at last. This is the third major release of the platform (the first since rebranding to Wear OS), and Google finally shows an understanding that what people want from a smartwatch is not a phone replacement. They want a reliable daily assistant and coach that is fast and unobtrusive. The new system doesn't have obvious battery life enhancements, though, which is still a major pain that the industry has yet to solve. It may be up to Google's partners to figure that out for themselves.
Google rebrands Android Wear as Wear OS
Android Wear, Google's big attempt to get into the wearables space, hasn't been the runaway blockbuster hit the company had banked on. In order to give the platform a much-needed shot in the arm, the company has sought to rebrand the software as Wear OS by Google.
