Hot on the heels of the Apple Watch, Intel unveiled a new luxury wearable at a media event on Monday, aimed at women with a snakeskin band and AT&T connectivity – no phone pairing necessary. Priced at $495, the smart bracelet, thing, allows users to receive, dismiss, and reply to text messages, email, and Facebook and Google notifications, completely independent of a smartphone.
As well as lapis stones, obsidian and an 18k gold coating, the MICA includes a sapphire 1.6-inch, 256 x 160 OLED curved screen on the inside of the wrist. Inside, you’ll find two days of battery life and a micro-USB hidden in the clasp for charging. There’s several styles available, including black water snake skin, pearls from China, lapis stones from Madagascar, white water snake skin, tiger’s eye from South Africa and obsidian from Russia – boy, are my fashion senses tingling.
Made for “women on the go”, Intel has introduced “Time to Go” reminders on the MICA, which uses technology from both Intel and TomTom. It uses location data to remind you of appointments automatically, and also serves up Yelp data to clue you in on ratings and reviews of a local business you may be visiting.
Intel says it will begin offering the MICA band in early December through Opening Ceremony and Barney’s upscale department stores. It runs on a custom version of Linux, giving developers yet another platform to developer for – oh joy!
Does the MICA remind anyone else of an old-fashion beeper?
[via Daily Mail]