Wearables specialist Fitbit has acquired a part of the assets of UK-based smartwatch manufacturer Vector Watch and will open a centre for R&D and services in Romania's capital of Bucharest, writes local paper Ziarul Financiar, citing Vector Watch founder and CTO, Andrei Pitis.
Vector Watch was launched in March 2016 in the 'affordable luxury' smartwatch sector. It was acquired for its software platform and design team, Pitis told TechCrunch.com. The deal comes soon after Fitbit acquired smartwatch company Pebble, in November 2016. The opening of the new company in Bucharest suggests that Fitbit is continuing to add talent to its team and that the company doesn't seek to enter the 'affordable luxury' smartwatch sector.
Vector Watch was led by top executives from London and former executives from Citizen watches from a headquarters in London. Its engineering team was based in Romania.
Following the acquisition, new Vector Watches product features (software and hardware) will not be added, Vector Watch announced on its website. However, Vector Watch products can still be purchased from worldwide retailers.
Fitbit set up in November 2016 a Romanian company called Fitbit Development that will manage the R&D centre in Romania's capital. The request for the establishment of the company was filed on 4 November, which suggests much of the details of the deal with Vector Watch had been most likely agreed then. The Romanian company is owned by Fitbit International which is headquartered in the US.
The Romanian unit's administrators are Andrew Paul Missan and Ronald Wayne Kislink. Missan is vice president of Fitbit. Vector Watch founder Pitis became VP for Engineering of the US company. He said the centre in Bucharest will carry out top activities and not routine ones. The centre will cover research, management, design and engineering software for the company's products. It will define the company's products besides handling implementation, Pitis said.
