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According to a recent event in Shanghai, Swatch’s Bellamy ‘Pay by Wrist’ watch will be launched in China starting January 2016. The product is meant to stimulate Chinese users to completely replace traditional payment methods with Near Field Communication (NFC) tools.
Swatch’s CEO Nick Hayek took part at Wednesday’s event. He was accompanied by China Union Pay’s Vice Chairman, Chen Zhi and Tao Wen from the Personal Finance Services Department of the Bank of Communications. The three heads presented the new watch to the public and provided us with some of its tech specifications.
According to their official declaration, the ‘pay by wrist’ watch will work as a regular Swatch model and will allow wearers to make remote payments for the purchased items with the help of the Near Field Communication (NFC) service. Customers, who were hoping they would get to wear a timeless timepiece from the Swiss producer, will be disappointed to hear that the new model is not a smartwatch.
The watch won’t be capable of performing any of the tasks that Apple and other smartwatch producers are bragging about because it will only focus on safe remote transactions. The three company representatives have added that users have to activate the service after they purchase the watch. They can do this at any branches of the Bank of Communications in China.
Compared to other payment or smart watches, Swath’s timepiece is rather affordable. Customers only have to pay $90 to get the new watch. They can also choose between black, white, pink and white and blue models.
Swatch has explained that the name of the collection, Bellamy, was inspired by the novelist, Edward Bellamy. The latter published a book in which cash money was completely replaced with credit and debit cards. Since he was the first to introduce the concept of remote payment, Swatch decided to commemorate him by naming the entire collection after him.
U.S. and Swiss customers don’t have to fear that the timepiece won’t be available for them. The Swiss manufacturer will launch ‘pay by wrist’ watches in their countries, as well, as soon as the watch will be launched on the Chinese market.
Image source: www.swatchgroup.com
