谷歌推出智能手錶配套服務系統

Google sought yesterday to steal a march on Apple and breathe life into a new market for “wearable” computing devices, as it showed off a range of stripped down internet services such as voice-activated search to feature on a coming generation of smartwatches.

谷歌(Google)昨日試圖偷偷地超越蘋果(Apple)，給“可穿戴”計算設備這一新市場注入活力。該公司展示了一系列精簡版的互聯網服務，比如語音激活搜索，這些服務將搭載於即將推出的新一代智能手錶上。

Apple laid the ground last month for its own iWatch, with the announcement of a fitness app that would act as a hub for a user’s health information, much of it collected from around the body by sensors embedded in wearable gadgets.

蘋果上月爲自己的iWatch夯實了基礎。它宣佈推出一款健身應用，該應用將扮演用戶健康信息中心的角色——這些信息有很大一部分是由嵌入可穿戴設備的傳感器從用戶身體各處收集的。

The big US tech companies have raced to establish a wearables market as the growth in smartphone sales has levelled off in the developed world, carrying over the tactics they honed in the smartphone wars. Google’s approach, using a new version of its Android smartphone operating system, relies on rallying a range of electronics companies to make devices using its services.

由於發達國家智能手機銷售增長已近極限，美國大型科技公司沿襲它們在智能手機大戰中提煉出的戰術，展開了一場建立可穿戴設備市場的競賽。谷歌的做法是使用新版Android智能手機操作系統，這一戰術的基礎是要聚攏一批電子廠商，生產使用谷歌服務的設備。

“Google has a big ecosystem advantage; they have a lot of companies working on it,” said Geoff Blaber, a mobile industry analyst at CCS Insight. “But like tablets, it will probably take a couple of generations for these to really catch on with consumers, and Apple has a big brand advantage over any of these manufacturers.”

“谷歌在生態系統方面擁有巨大優勢；很多廠商都在生產谷歌系統的可穿戴設備。但像平板電腦一樣，這些廠商的可穿戴設備很可能要到第三四代時才能真正受到消費者的追捧，而蘋果相對這些廠商中的任何一家都擁有巨大的品牌優勢，”CCS Insight移動行業分析師傑夫•布拉韋爾(Geoff Blaber)表示。

The first Google-powered smartwatches, from LG and Samsung, are available to order now, though no date was given when they would be shipped. A Motorola watch will also go on sale this summer.

LG和三星(Samsung)推出的首批搭載谷歌系統的智能手錶現已接受訂購，儘管具體發貨日期還未公佈。摩托羅拉(Motorola)的一款智能手錶也將於今夏上市。

The battle to attract users will depend on creating useful services for smartwatches, according to analysts, explaining why the big tech companies have used their annual developer events to lay out their plans.

在解釋爲何大型科技公司要利用它們的年度開發者大會公佈它們的規劃時，分析師們表示，這場用戶爭奪戰的勝負將取決於誰能爲智能手錶打造有用的服務。

“As with Apple’s push into health apps ahead of its iWatch launch, wearables’ success lies in creating an ‘ecosystem’ of apps before consumers will be prepared to buy new devices,” said Carolina Milanesi, an analyst with Kantar Worldpanel.

Kantar Worldpanel分析師卡羅琳娜•米拉內西(Carolina Milanesi)表示：“與蘋果在發佈iWatch前進軍健康應用領域一樣，可穿戴設備要想獲得成功，就必須在消費者做好準備購買新設備前，建立一套應用的‘生態系統’。”

Google said smartphone users checked their screens 120 times a day on average, and that smartwatches could replace some of the interaction. The watches could give “intelligent answers to spoken questions”, and act as a “key in a multi-screen world”, it said.

谷歌表示，智能手機用戶每天平均瀏覽手機屏幕120次，其中部分互動可被智能手錶取代。該公司還表示，智能手錶可“對口頭提出的問題給出智能的解答”，充當“多屏世界的一把鑰匙”。

The announcements came as Google pushed Android into a range of new markets. It announced a version for cars, called Android Auto, and a TV set-top box, named Android TV.

宣佈上述消息的同時，谷歌也將Android系統推向了一系列新市場。該公司宣佈推出名爲“Android Auto”的車載信息系統和名爲“Android TV”的電視機頂盒。