HOT Watch Turns Your Hand into a Phone

There’s a new smartwatch in town and this one is literally hot! The HOT Watch is a brand new gadget that finally allows you to live out one of your dreams as a kid: talking to your watch like James Bond.

Developed by PH Technical Labs, the HOT Watch is equipped with a microphone and a directional speaker and lets users answer calls and talk on the phone just by holding their hand to the ear. This will probably make you look a bit crazy to non-connoisseurs, but it will definitely be cool.

The HOT in the smartwatch’s name is an acronym for Hands On Talk technology, created by PH Technical Labs and currently awaiting patent registration.

All you have to do is sync the watch with your smartphone via Bluetooth. When you get a call, your palm will reflect and amplify the sound waves directly into your ears, eliminating the need  to use a separate headset. Manufacturers say the Hands On Talk technology works perfectly and delivers clear sound for both the wearer and the caller.

The HOT Watch phone function can be activated just by touching the screen or by specific hand gestures if the optional HOT Gestures feature is activated. The feature allows wearers to set the watch to recognize and respond to specific movements: for instance, moving your hand to the ear while receiving a call will automatically answer it, while shaking it will send the call to voicemail.

Besides this innovative way of taking calls, the smartwatch is equipped with most of the features seen in a smartphone: text messaging, reading emails, listening to music through the native player on your connected phone, and others.

The arrows show how sound waves bounce off the wearer’s cupped hand to reach their ear.

It is also provided with various apps to give the wearer easy access to weather data, stocks information, a calendar, news and social networks such as Twitter and Facebook. Manufacturers plan to provide an SDK that will allow programmers to create their own apps.

And on top of everything else, the HOT Watch can also tell the time and offer other normal timepiece features, along with several different watch faces. It measures just 1.3×1.7×0.3 inch, is equipped with a special display with anti-reflective glass and is powered by two processors: a Cortex M3 for most basic functions and a DSP for Bluetooth, calls, audio systems.

The HOT smartwatch is currently on Kickstarter, where backers can get one by pledging upwards of $119. The campaign has raised almost three times its goal of $150,000 and still has 20 days left. The watch is expected to start shipping in December.

[Images via Kickstarter & gigaom]