Montblanc TimeWalker Urban Speed e-Strap

2015 will be remembered as the year when watch brands started taking the smartwatch wave seriously. TAG Heuer has promised to unveil it’s smartwatch at CES and Swatch will follow sometimes during the summer. As much as I’m curious to see these “watches”, I am also quite sceptical and I really hope, I will be proven wrong.

During the Holidays, news started to leek out that Montblanc has something under the belt, or under the strap to be more specific. The rumours were correct, the brand with the “white star” has announced the TimeWalker Urban Speed e-Strap, basically a interchangeable smartstrap — called e-Strap — that can be used with contemporary TimeWalker pieces.

The e-Strap has all the features we would expect from a wearable gadget: activity tracker, smart notifications, remote controls, Find-Me functions and it will connect via Bluetooth Low Energy to your Android or iOS phone. On top of all this, you can wear it with a gorgeous piece like this:

A Montblanc TimeWalker Urban Speed on the e-Strap.

Thank you Montblanc! You just showed the world how to approach the smartwatch craze by thinking outside the box.

A few months ago, when I wrote about the Senturion Key smartbracelet, I was expressing my desire for a smartbracelet that can be used with any watch, even with your father’s vintage watch.

When I asked an engineer friend of mine, would it be possible to make such a bracelet? He pointed out that the current technology would permit it, the only problem with miniaturization is the source of energy that is not quite there yet and such a device would have a limited autonomy.

Even the Apple Watch seems to have a very limited battery life, even your average automatic watch would kick the Apple Watch’s ass in autonomy.

Getting back to the e-Strap, Montblanc excelled in this field too. According to their specs the e-Strap can go on for five days, before it would need to be charged.

New TimeWalker models

Before you would go, a few hints we got about the new TimeWalker pieces. The collection will grow with three new models: a chronograph, a UTC (United Time Coordinated) with a second time zone and a three hands watch with the essential functionality of hours, minutes, seconds and date, all of them automatic.

They should hit the market, with or without the e-Strap in June 2015.

For the prices, here are the German RSP, including 19% VAT:

• Timewalker Urban Speed automatic e-Strap, 42mm – 2.990 euros
• Timewalker Urban Speed UTC e-Strap– 3.990 euros
• Timewalker Urban Speed chronograph e-Strap – 4.690 euros
• E-Strap, compatible with iPhone 4S, Galaxy Note 3, Galaxy S4 and upwards – 350 euros

More about Montblanc at www.montblanc.com