Will 2015 be the year of the wearables?

While the global wearable technology market hasn't delivered on high expectations, 2015 could be the year that turns this around, according to Visiongain, the business intelligence provider.

Visiongain says the wearables market so far hasn't quite delivered on expectations of revenue, consumer adoption and technological advances.

However, 2015 might be the breakthrough year in which wearables begin to achieve the mass market acceptance that has long been expected.

The value of the global wearables technology market in 2015 will reach $16.1 billion, says Visiongain.

One of the main reasons for this, according to Visiongain, is the entrance of Apple to the smart watches market. This will disrupt not only the smart watches market, but the overall size of the wearable technology market.

In 2015, the Apple smart watch will deliver many of the applications already delivered by fitness and activity trackers. This will result in companies competing with smart bracelets and other trackers suffering market loss, and by 2018 witnessing great disruption to their specific market.

The global market for wearable cameras could also be facing dramatic changes, but this will not be caused by the entrance of new competitors, says Visiongain.

Instead this will be caused by changing consumer demand and rapid penetration in highly developed economies. This, in turn, will trigger changes in the business strategies of the dominant brands, and will enhance the revenue models for these devices.

Contrastingly, augmented reality (AR) and smart glasses, as well as e-textiles, will not deliver dramatic results in the near future due to the fact that these technologies will not deliver great value to consumers or business users.

Instead, most of the shipments and revenue growth for these submarkets will come after 2018, where there will be strategic changes in terms of technologies, applications and costs.

Overall, each of the submarkets and regional markets within the wearables industry will deliver different business opportunities, but are also expected to face challenges which include regulatory decisions in the case of mHealth, low added value in terms of smart watches or high saturation levels for wearable cameras, says Visiongain.

According to Visiongain various companies hold the greatest potential in the wearables market, including Adidas, Fitbit, GoPro, Jawbone, Noke, Motorola/Lenovo, Pebble Technology, Samsung and Sony.