Yes, you heard us right. A smartwatch that's running Windows 10 is happening, but you might be disappointed to hear that it's not going to be an Apple Watch or Samsung Gear rival.
OEM TrekStor is set to pack Microsoft's operating system into a wearable that's being built for business and commercial uses. Set to run on Windows 10 IoT Core, the smartwatch will be able to run Universal Windows Applications and will be able to connect to the cloud.
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Specs are slim on the ground at the moment, but it will feature a 1.54-inch display with Gorilla Glass 3 to add a layer of protection, which will be held in a soft casing. It'll support both notifications and voice messages.
On the connectivity front there'll be Bluetooth and Wi-Fi onboard and apparently plenty of storage space, processing power and battery life to perform in a variety of business-related scenarios.
Revealed in a Microsoft blog post, those business uses could include inventory management in retail, automation for guest services in hospitality, industrial automation in manufacturing and patient care in healthcare.
While Microsoft continues to make a push with its mixed reality and VR efforts, the Redmond company has backed away from making other wearables having canned the Microsoft Band in late 2016. The fitness tracker and smartwatch hybrid didn't run on Windows 10 relying on Microsoft's own wearables architecture.
So it's a still a pretty big deal that the operating system that's appeared on a whole heap of other devices including smartphones and laptops, is finally making an appearance on a wearable. It's just a shame we probably won't have much reason to use it.
More details of the TrekStor smartwatch is expected to be revealed over the coming months, so stay tuned to find out if it's worth getting excited about.
Source: Windows Blog
How we test
By Michael Sawh
Michael Sawh has been covering the wearable tech industry since the very first Fitbit landed back in 2011. Previously the resident wearable tech expert at Trusted Reviews, he also marshaled the features section of T3.com.
He also regularly contributed to T3 magazine when they needed someone to talk about fitness trackers, running watches, headphones, tablets, and phones.
Michael writes for GQ, Wired, Coach Mag, Metro, MSN, BBC Focus, Stuff, TechRadar and has made several appearances on the BBC Travel Show to talk all things tech.
Michael is a lover of all things sports and fitness-tech related, clocking up over 15 marathons and has put in serious hours in the pool all in the name of testing every fitness wearable going. Expect to see him with a minimum of two wearables at any given time.