Swatch CEO signals plans to add to smartwatch range: Swiss paper

[August 22, 2015]  ZURICH (Reuters) - Swatch plans to add to its new smartwatch range, the Swiss watchmaker's chief executive told a newspaper in an interview published on Saturday.

The Biel, Switzerland-based company is competing with Apple and other watchmakers in the budding smartwatch market.

"Our product is called Touch Zero One and that gives enough room for Zero Five, Zero Nine," Nick Hayek was quoted as saying by Switzerland's Tages-Anzeiger newspaper. "The Touch Zero One is not the end of the progression."

Hayek told the paper Swatch would launch Touch Zero Two at next year's Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.

The Swiss company's strategy appears primarily to revolve around including individual tech features in different models rather than going head to head with Apple to create all-in-one smartwatches combining many functions.

On top of its Touch Zero One, which can track the distance the wearer travels and help beach volleyball players measure the power of their hits, Swatch is planning to launch watches with an embedded "near field communication" chip this year.

(Reporting by Joshua Franklin; editing by David Clarke)

[© 2015 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved.]

Copyright 2015 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.