In just over a week Apple will hold a special event on March 9, which the New York Times says the company will share new details about the Apple Watch. According to unnamed employees speaking to the Times, some new details have been shared about the project.
Apple Watch has been code-named ‘Gizmo’ according to anonymous employees that worked on the project, which said it was an engineering challenge. To keep the smart watch secret outside Apple headquarters for testing, engineers “even created fake casing that made the Apple device resemble a Samsung watch.”
The team that worked on the Apple Watch is being described as an “all-star team”, bringing together top designers and engineers that worked on the iPhone, iPad and Mac. The challenges that faced development included figuring out how to cram various sensors onto the circuit board which is the size of a postage stamp.
As for the best tidbit from the article, is a feature called ‘Power Reserve’, which is set to extend battery life by only enabling a time-only mode:
The company also developed a yet-to-be-announced feature called Power Reserve, a mode that will run the watch on low energy but display only the time, according to one employee.
Development for Apple Watch was delayed as some engineers were poached by Google-owned Nest last year, including former director of iPod software Bryan James (he became VP for engineering at Nest in early 2014). Nest is run by former Apple executive, Tony Fadell, known as the ‘father’ of the iPod.
The NYT also spoke with David Barnard, developer of Launch Center Pro, who revealed an Apple Watch app will be coming for the wearable.
Apple’s ‘Spring Forward’ event is set for March 9 at 10AM PST, at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco, where the company has started to build an external covered area outside the building, expected to be a demo area for the Apple Watch again, similar to what the company did at the Flint Center last September when it announced the wearable.
Apple’s Canadian website for Apple Watch says the device will be “Available in 2015”, whereas the U.S. site says it will be “Coming Early 2015”, suggesting Canada may not be part of the initial launch.
