Skip to main content

Sony’s e-ink FES Watch goes on sale this week

The FES Watch, Sony’s e-ink watch that launched on its internal crowdfunding site First Flight last year, is coming to stores in Japan this week. MoMA Design Store in Omotesando and Isetan in Shinjuku will be the first to sell the watch; two retailers that target fashion more than the technology market.

First unveiled in September under the guise of Sony’s subsidiary Fashion Entertainments, the FES Watch re-appeared on First Flight later in the year. Sony wanted to see how popular the product was without a major name behind it, hence why it used an off-shoot brand. It gained lots of interest worldwide for its minimalist design and multiple design options.

Updated on 11-16-2015 by David Curry: Added in information on Japanese commercial launch.

The FES Watch uses e-paper across both the face of the timepiece and the strap, allowing both to be customized by the user. It doesn’t have all of the smart notification features of an Android Wear device — Sony already has the Smartwatch 3 to cover that base — but it has an understated minimalist look and a choice of 24 different faces. What’s more, thanks to the low power draw of e-ink, it can last for up to 60 days between battery charges.

The FES Watch is one of the first products out of the First Flight program to become a commercial product, and may not have received any support at all had the program not been unveiled. The watch quickly reached its target of 2 million yen ($16,900) last year, and was sent to backers earlier in the year. Finally, after six months, it will be available for customers that didn’t get a chance to back it.

Five Sony engineers make up the Fashion Entertainments team and they are working on these e-ink concepts in addition to their daily duties at the corporation. According to the WSJ, Sony is “encouraging its employees to come up with new product or business ideas” through a scheme similar to Google’s famous ’20 percent free time’ scheme used in the past.

Another watch project, named Sony Wena, launched on First Flight in September, offering all of the smart functionality inside the strap rather than the watch. Wena reached its 10 million yen ($82,500) milestone very quickly, eventually reaching 100 million yen ($825,000) and becoming the most successful project on the crowdfunding site.

Editors' Recommendations

David Nield
Dave is a freelance journalist from Manchester in the north-west of England. He's been writing about technology since the…
Moto Watch 100 goes official, skips Wear OS for an affordable price tag
Moto Watch 100

After being rumored for months, the Moto Watch 100 has finally been officially announced. This new watch might bring back flashes of the Moto 360 smartwatch that launched in 2019, but there are few similarities between the two apart from the fact that its creator is still the same manufacturer, eBuyNow, that also made the Moto 360.

One of the key changes with the Moto Watch 100 is that it has completely replaced Wear OS with a brand new Moto OS made from scratch. A lot about this new software is unknown, but one of the key advantages, according to the product page, is prolonged battery life. So, while Wear OS would only last two to three days, Moto OS extends battery life to two weeks. By priorotizing fitness-centric features, Motorola has chosen a route similar to Chinese OEMs such as OnePlus and Realme while sacrificing third-party apps.

Read more
Samsung Galaxy Watch Active vs. Samsung Galaxy Watch
samsung galaxy watch active

The Samsung Galaxy Watch Active was 2019's follow-up to the then-flagship Galaxy Watch that launched late in 2018. The device is beautiful, comfortable to wear, and offers great fitness tracking features, but it's more of an alternative to the Galaxy Watch, rather than a successor.

So what are the differences? Which device is better for your needs? Should you buy the smaller and cheaper Galaxy Watch Active, or shell out for the larger watch? We put the Galaxy Watch against the Galaxy Watch Active in a head-to-head test to find out.
Specs

Read more
Why it’s fine the Big Bang e is a cool Hublot watch, but not a great smartwatch
hublot big bang e premier league hands on features price photos release date

At $5,200, the Hublot Big Bang e Premier League is one of the world’s most expensive smartwatches, yet it has a lower technical specification than the $300 Mobvoi TicWatch Pro 3. If that’s as far as you read, that’s fine, but if you’re intrigued as to why anyone would pay any attention to such a thing at all, I'll explain. It's about leaving the tech behind, and understanding that the Big Bang e is a true Hublot watch, and when looked at like that, actually rather reasonably priced. I know how this sounds, but stick with me.
The build and the materials
The Big Bang e’s case is made from titanium, the bezel and buckle from ceramic, and the screen is covered in sapphire crystal. The case uses Hublot’s preferred “sandwich” design, and it’s all held together with tiny screws. It’s a very long way from the plastic or stainless steel cases we’re used to seeing, and understanding why this matters is the beginning of understanding why someone may want one.

On the side is a large crown with a rubber coating and tip, making it easy to twist and navigate Google’s Wear OS menus. The strap is made from rubber and fabric, and is secured using a Velcro fastening, looped through the ceramic buckle emblazoned with Hublot’s name. The strap has a quick-release mechanism, the same as it uses on other Big Bang watch models, so if the purple isn’t for you, it can be changed to a different version from Hublot.

Read more