LG Electronics said that it will be unveiling its first all-metal luxury smartwatch, the LG Watch Urbane, at the upcoming Mobile World Congress.
An early look at the device shows that LG's new offering could be headed for a straight-on collision with Apple's first entry into the wearable device market, the Apple Watch.
The name of Android-powered smartwatch suggests that it has been designed with the cosmopolitan and sophisticated user in mind, as the LG Watch Urbane looks to combine fashion and style with performance and technology.
The LG Watch Urbane is loosely based on the company's previous smartwatch offering, the G Watch R, which is the very first smartwatch that features a full circular P-OLED display. The G Watch R, released in October of last year, was developed for active users.
The LG Watch Urbane, in contrast, has a more formal look with thinner profiles that resemble those of luxury watches. Using a similar 1.3-inch P-OLED full circle display as the G Watch R, the upcoming smartwatch uses a narrower bezel for sleeker lines and a stainless steel frame that comes in either gold or silver. The watch also comes with a stitched natural leather strap that users can choose to replace with any other 22-millimeter watch band depending on the user's mood or occasion.
Also similar to the G Watch R, the LG Watch Urbane comes with a photoplethysmography sensor that is able to measure the heart rate and pulse of the wearer while exercising. The smartwatch also has the Always On ambient mode, which continuously displays the time on the device's screen but in dimmed mode, which saves the battery life of the smartwatch.
According to LG Electronics Mobile Communications Company CEO and President Juno Cho, the LG Watch Urbane's classic looks complement the active and casual design of the G Watch and G Watch R.
"LG Watch Urbane is an important part of our strategy to develop wearable devices that are worn and viewed as everyday accessories, not electronic gadgets," Cho added.
The LG Watch Urbane features a 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 chipset with 4GB eMMC of memory and 512MB LPDDR2 RAM. The device is dust and water resistant and has a battery of 410 mAh.
Measuring 45.5 millimeters by 52.2 millimeter by 10.9 millimeters, The LG Watch Urbane is smaller than the G Watch R, which has measurements of 46.4 millimeters by 54.6 millimeters by 11.1 millimeters
The LG Watch Urbane will come with the latest version of the Android Wear operating system, which will allow the smartwatch to connect with smartphones powered by Android 4.3 and higher.
The LG Watch Urbane will be launched within the first half of the year. Pricing details, however, are not yet known.
