When talking about smart wearable, our first reaction is smart watch, which is the most popular smart wearable product in recent years. However, the plot seems to reverse. Recently, according to the latest prediction of Gartner, a world-renowned research organization, the dominant position of smart watches in the wearable device market is short, and ear devices will replace them by 2022 - that is, what we often call smart headphones.
Since this year, it has gradually been seen that major global and domestic manufacturers have successively invested in the R & D and updating of smart headphones. In addition to the familiar apple airplads, Xiaomi, Lenovo, glory, Tencent, JD and Microsoft all joined them. It is gratifying for the wearable device industry that the forecast shows that the market is expected to grow by 26% next year compared with 2018. What is a smart headset and how can it bring us an intelligent life scene?
Smart headphones become de mobile devices
Starting this year, smart headphones have become one of the hottest smart devices after smart speakers. According to the latest data released by Gartner, the research organization, the shipments of earphone devices, that is, we often say smart headphones, will reach 33.44 million this year, a year-on-year increase of 55.6% compared with 21.49 million in 2017. It is expected that by 2019 next year, the shipment of such equipment will reach 46.12 million units. What surprises the industry most is that the data predicts that by 2022, the shipment of ear worn smart devices will reach 158 million units, accounting for more than 30% of the shipment of all wearable devices, far exceeding the current most popular smart watches. At that time, the shipment volume of the latter will also reach 111.5 million.
Wearable smart devices have always been the field that technology manufacturers are keen to "explore", from the initial smart bracelets, smart watches, wearable headwear, body sensing clothes, and then to smart headphones. Everyone has used or even often used headphones, so what is smart headphones? Although there is no unified concept at present, the consensus in the industry is that smart headphones are equipped with chips, emphasize the use of voice interaction function, and add more components such as sensors (such as gravity accelerator) to optimize or expand the experience and function of headphones.
According to the China Industry Information Research Report, the whole smart headset industry will become a market of more than 40 billion US dollars in 2020. It is expected to increase from 5 million in 2016 to 71 million in 2020.
At present, smart headphones are mostly used for talking and listening to songs, especially suitable for listening to songs and watching videos in public space, or during running, fitness, driving, etc. However, the industry has more room for imagination. According to gints klimanis, former director of audio engineering at Doppler, the ultimate idea is to grab the "cake" from smartphones. Smart phones may never disappear completely, but the combination of voice command and hearing may become the main interface for any spontaneous behavior.
The mainstream market of earphones is also an era leading technology brought by the earphone airpods launched by apple. Therefore, for bluetooth earphones, some major Bluetooth headset technologies are also inspired by Apple!
Different from the Bluetooth headset of traditional manufacturers, it is a truly "wireless" in ear headset. At that time, Apple CEO cook personally wore headphones to exercise to prove that the device would not fall even during strenuous sports such as running. Since this year, the smart earphones launched by domestic manufacturers such as Lenovo, glory and Xiaomi are also completely "wireless". At the same time, the volume of the in ear earphones on the left and right sides is smaller. The charging mode is to place the earphones in the charging box for charging.
According to the reporter's experience, the biggest "embarrassment" of wireless headphones at present is not that they are easy to fall during exercise, but that they will "slip and hold unstable" or be easy to lose during daily use. Mr. Cheng, a technology lover, told reporters that shortly after he started airpods, he put a headset in his bag after listening to the music, and then he couldn't find it. "I don't know how he lost it.". Therefore, some manufacturers choose another design direction, that is, the headset or ear hook, which is closer to the traditional Bluetooth wireless headset.
Secondly, it emphasizes voice interaction. With the development of smart headphones, one of the main intelligent experiences is the voice interaction function. According to the report of China smart headset market analysis released by jiefukai, at present, the voice control of headphones has been mentioned to an important position. The physical button of the headset is gradually cancelled, which breaks people's habit of using the headset and forces the user to carry out relevant operations through the voice assistant.
Nowadays, the development of smart headphones is closely related to voice interaction. For example, by tapping airpods twice, Siri can be awakened; Glory headset Flypods series and its smart life YOYO "combination", as long as through the voice wake-up command, you can complete the open application, WeChat or Alipay's two-dimensional code, call the car, cut songs and other operations; The newly launched Microsoft intelligent headset surface headset has built-in intelligent voice assistant Cortana, which is the familiar "Xiaona" intelligent voice platform.
In the future, smart headphones will "replace" more mobile phone functions
According to China smart headset market analysis, in 2017, the retail volume of Bluetooth headset in China reached 13.63 million, accounting for 56% of the whole headset headset market. This year, China's smart headset retail market will reach 500000 units. In addition to the domestic hardware equipment manufacturers such as Lenovo, glory and Xiaomi mentioned above, Internet companies such as Tencent and Baidu have also joined hands with traditional headphone manufacturers to "test the water" smart headphones. In addition, AI voice companies such as go out and ask, iFLYTEK, etc. have also launched their own smart headphones.
Go out and ask CEO Li Zhifei. He said that in the future voice interaction, smart headphones are a central position. He believes that to become the next explosion point of voice interaction, we need to have several characteristics: first, it is more portable; Second, privacy; Third, clear. A particularly important voice interaction device is AI wireless intelligent headset.
In addition to being used in conjunction with speech recognition, smart headphones are implanted with motion related functions, such as heart rate, motion monitoring, etc. It is understood that some smart headphones supporting heart rate monitoring have built-in heart rate monitoring modules. After downloading the corresponding app through the mobile phone, its recorded data can be displayed on the app to inform users of their heart rate at different exercise times. According to the heart rate data, suggestions will be made on the user's exercise mode and exercise intensity, which is a good function for sports enthusiasts.
In fact, heart rate monitoring is one of the mainstream functions of many smart wearable devices, such as smart watches, bracelets, running shoes, headphones and so on. Apple said that heart rate monitoring is one of the most popular features on the apple watch.
In the future, the role of smart headphones is far more than that. According to the survey report, the smart headset will have a larger storage capacity and sports system, so that more functions will be realized independently on the headset. It is worth noting that a new bone voiceprint recognition technology is adopted on Flypods pro.
For this new voice recognition technology, Zhao Ming, President of glory, said that the sound propagation characteristics of bone voiceprint are different from those of air sound. After research, it is found that it can be used as an ID for identity recognition. After wearing headset, users can open the Alipay page and mobile phone to unlock.
Gartner believes that at present, ear wearable devices are mainly used for fitness, communication and entertainment. With the increasing range of functions, it is expected that their shipments will begin to rise, "In the future, ear devices will support virtual personal assistants, which can be used for a variety of tasks such as query and hands-free navigation. Advanced headset devices can reduce the use of smart phones because they will take over many tasks currently solved by smart phones.".
