Wearable shipments surge in Q2 driven by health, mobile payments
Shipments of wristworn wearables, including smartwatches, basic watches and wristbands, rose 29% from a year ago to 32 million shipments in the second quarter, driven largely by health as well as mobile payment use, according to International Data Corp.
IDC reported the top five companies in the sector, Xiaomi, Apple, Huawei, Fitbit and Samsung, captured about 66% of the market collectively, an increase of 12% from a year ago.
"Beyond health, mobile payment is also starting to become a mainstay as roughly two out of five wrist borne wearables now include NFC, and many more simply use QR codes to complete transactions," Jitesh Ubrani, research manager for IDC Mobile Device Trackers, said in a company release.
Cover image courtesy of iStock.