Richemont launching smart straps

Richemont certainly knows that their luxury watches will have some tough competition now thanks to the Apple smartwatch. Of course, they couldn't just stand by and let themselves fall from grace. The luxury goods maker is launching their own line of high-tech watch straps to compete with Apple's smartwatch.

IWC Schauffhausen has plans to embed a communication device into the beds of their timepieces, which will still be mechanical, as was announced on Tuesday on the Compagnie Financiere Richemont SpA website. The new IWC Connect will let users track their activities and connect with other devices. “We’ve engineered an intelligent design solution which perfectly integrates and underlines our product worlds,” IWC chief executive officer Georges Kern said in a statement. “We do not touch our beautiful watches.”

Richemont is taking a different approach from their main competitor, LVMH Moet Hennessey, who plans on launching a Tag Heuer smartwatch. Montblanc, which is owned by Richemont, will start selling 388 dollar e-straps that can give previews of incoming messages and control a smartphone's camera. While no details have been revealed yet as to the release date or price for the IWC Connect, it's sure to give Apple a run for it's money, the smartwatch market just got a little bit tougher, so, hopefully Apple has an upgrade up its sleeve planned if they expect to stay on top.