Apple could generate more sales of its timepiece by cutting the umbilical cord attaching it to the iPhone for set up and activation
Apple Watch Series 7 will be released this coming Friday
It’s not that Apple hasn’t tried to wean its smartwatch off of the iPhone. Perhaps the most important was the 2017 release of the Apple Watch Series 3 which was the first model to be available with an LTE cellular connection. This meant that the infamous Johnny Appleseed could accidentally leave his iPhone at home, and still use his Apple Watch.
But the main point here is that despite strong sales of the Apple Watch, which outsells those regal Swiss names that have been around for generations, without an iPhone you cannot set up and activate an Apple Watch. Thus, the popularity of the product has been achieved with one hand tied behind its back. Making the Apple Watch totally independent would require it to download data from the cloud and get activated by the user’s wireless provider.
The bottom line is that the device could become a larger part of Apple’s business as Android users and others who aren’t beholden to the Apple ecosystem become potential Apple Watch buyers. This, Gurman says, would require Apple and the carriers to work out a way to offer service to the device as a stand-alone product.
