That's right, for US$150, the new Alcatel Watch can easily pass off as the more expensive Motorola Moto 360. For those following the developments in this wearables space, you can easily tell them apart as there are subtle design differences that give the Moto 360 the upper hand for being a more polished product.
First things first, unlike a barrage of recent smart watches, the Alcatel Watch doesn't run on Android Wear, but it uses a proprietary system (like Pebble for example). According to Alcatel executives, they would like the Watch to be compatible with a wide ecosystem of products and didn't join in the Android Wear bandwagon. So instead, Alcatel has an app for Android and the iOS platform to communicate with the watch.
Despite using its own implementation on the Watch, it looks and functions rather similarly to an Android Wear compatible gadget. However, functionality is limited to providing notifications from your phone, change watch faces as you prefer and monitor your heart rate when required.
There's a colorful horizontal list of functions and setting toggles for the Watch.
The last but important piece of information is the battery life of the Watch and it's rated for up to five days of usage before requiring a charge. That's a fair bit more than most other current smart watches and it's probably attributed to the custom OS for the Watch combined with the simplicity of the device.
Where the Alcatel Watch differs from most other smart watches is how you charge it. Built-in within the strap is a USB interface that allows you to plug it directly your PC or equivalent USB charging outlet. Unfortunately, this also means you cannot change the watch strap with other readily available straps elsewhere. You can still change the watch straps, but only those sold by Alcatel.
The Alcatel Watch has a built-in USB interface to charge it directly; no proprietary cables or cradles to fumble with.
The Alcatel Watch is set to launch soon, estimated to be end of the month, at US$150. For now, availability in our region is unknown as with most new products launched at CES 2015. But there's hope as Alcatel smartphones have recently started selling in Singapore, so stay tuned for more updates!
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