Based on patent applications recently published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, it appears that Apple is busy developing hardware that will serve as smart accessories for its wearable device, the Apple Watch. Specifically, these will come in the form of watch band links that will add more capabilities to the Apple Watch’s already formidable arsenal of functionalities.
By choosing the modular approach to boosting the performance of its one and only smartwatch, Apple may have just up the ante on what wearables can do. Moreover, this approach allows for more flexibility and levels of customization. And the great thing about it is that the possibilities are near endless.
Indeed, no longer will the Apple Watch be limited to its native hardware and features. Soon, Apple Watch users will be able to add extra batteries and other external mobile power sources, chips, GPS systems, cameras, fitness trackers, speakers, SIM cards, external storage, and many more. And because Apple is making full use of smart band links, data can be transmitted from the Apple Watch to the accessory, and vice versa.
Apple first filed the patent applications for modular smart band links in February last year, with Motohide Hatanaka, Douglas J Weber, Brian Shadle, Alex M Lee, David S Herman, Patrick S Wieler, and Simon R Lancaster-Larocque all credited as inventors. Then in May 2015, Apple filed another application for a “Portable electronic device connector.”
It is not yet made clear if all this new technology will be made compatible with existing Apple Watch models. But it would be fair to expect that the next generation Apple Watch models, expected to be released later this year, might just start integrating these new smart band links.