Smartwatches can be quite useful devices, offering features such as fitness tracking, notifications, and shortcuts to perform tasks on a smartphone. Unfortunately, however, they are still struggling to gain wide appeal to consumers. Functional though they may be, traditional watches may still carry more appeal to some users. Some simply prefer the look of a traditional watch, while others may not like the idea of owning a watch that must be charged daily. While some smartwatches, such as the Huawei Watch, offer some sophisticated and attractive designs that resemble traditional watches, the need to recharge the battery frequently, and that is a common issue across wearable devices. Soon, however, the MATRIX PowerWatch will address this problem by introducing a solution that never needs to be recharged.
The PowerWatch is powered by the wearer’s body heat and never needs to be placed into a cradle to recharge. This is not the first body heat-powered watch, however, it offers more capabilities than body heat-powered mechanical watches. Although it can’t quite do everything that today’s top smartwatches can do, it does add some features that enhance the wearer’s experience, such as measurement of calories burned, activity level, sleep activity, and a readout of the power being generated by the wearer. When the watch is removed, it goes into sleep mode, and all data is stored until the wearer puts it back on. Unfortunately, body heat will not provide enough energy to power a fully featured smartwatch, complete with Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and a feature-rich wearable OS such as Android Wear, but it may offer a good compromise for those who have more basic smartwatch needs and place a high value on the convenience of not having to charge the device.
The PowerWatch Indiegogo page shows that the project, which has two months remaining, has already met and exceeded its goal of $100,000. The device is listed as being in the prototype stage, which means that a working version of the device capable of performing core functions is currently being tested. Those who pre-order the PowerWatch from the Indiegogo page will pay $119, but the company lists the suggested retail price as $169.99, and this will likely be the selling price when it is released to the public. There is no official release date yet, though the company has issued an expected release date of July 2017. To find out more about the MATRIX PowerWatch or support the project, head on over to their Indiegogo campaign page using the “Source” link below.
