Fitbit Blaze 2 – Pictures

We recently saw what I considered to be ‘OK’ Fitbit financial figures. Unfortunately Fitbit had told the markets to expect more and didn’t deliver. The shares headed South for a while.

It looks to me like Fitbit (obviously) knew in advance what the 2017 figures were going to be and so they coincided a couple of media events to give some softer reassurance to investors and potential customers.

First up we saw the announcement of the Ionic adidas edition. Let’s see how this pans out as they somewhat ape Apple’s linkup with Nike. ie same hardware, new app.

Then there were probably deliberate leaks of the new Fibit for 2018 to Wareable.com. It’s probably the Blaze 2 but equally could have a totally new name. I suppose it looks like the teenage child of the Apple Watch and the Pebble Time.

A lot of things need to fall in place to make Fitbit’s 2018 offerings move back into the market-leading position they once held.

The screen looks alright. But I suspect that once people have seen the Apple Watch 3 on their friends’ wrists they know what a screen should look like. Once they’ve seen their friends’ Garmin sports watches live for ever on one battery charge they will also know what a battery should do. Once they’ve seen the main app stores then they know what they should be able to get from an app store.

I think even Garmin are going to find it hard to move in on the mass smartwatch market. I can’t help but think Fitbit are going to find it even harder to be near the top in 5 years time. Maybe their staff acquisitions from Pebble will help. Let’s see.