This week’s Smart World Series features reports on the latest from Apple Watch, a smart toothbrush that offers dental insurance with perks, a new wireless dimmer from Philips for renters, Canada leading the smart city initiative, new health wearable trackers and more.

For those who missed last week’s Smart World Series, here’s a chance to catch up on the exciting developments in the connected world.  Each week, SiliconANGLE rounds up the top news trends regarding smart homes and cars, smart data centers and IT, smart infrastructure and all things related to the Internet of Things.

Apple planning a sensor band for Apple Watch 

Apple is said to be working on the Apple Watch 2, supposedly slated for a 2016 release. But before that device comes out, the Cupertino giant is said to be releasing a smart band for its current watch that will add more health tracking features to the device

Read more about Apple’s alleged smart band here.

Smart toothbrush’s insurance plan: New perks for hygiene

Beam Technologies launched a dental insurance plan that delivers some worthy perks for those who sign up. Aside from having over 200,000 access points for participating dentist offices, they will also get a quarterly shipment of toothpaste, floss and replacement toothbrush heads to make sure that they are taking good care of their mouth.

Read more about this exciting dental insurance plan here.

New wireless dimmer for Philips Hue smart lights

Royal Philips introduced a new wireless dimmer that works well with its existing Hue products by way of the Philips Hue Bridge. This device can be fixed on a wall or be placed anywhere the user pleases, so lights can be dimmed from multiple points in the house.

Also featured in this roundup is the Tile Gen 2 which adds a new Find your Phone feature, Amazon Echo’s update to become compatible with SmartThings connected devices, and how the smart home market is causing trouble for users while creating business opportunities for tech support service providers.

Read more about these in our Smart Living roundup.

Hortonworks buys startup to target IoT data

Hortonworks, Inc. acquired Onyara, Inc. for an undisclosed amount in hopes of integrating more support for data from the Industrial Internet movement. Onyara is responsible for the development of Apache Nifi, a platform that pulls information from connected device sensors for analysis. It was co-developed with the National Security Agency over nearly a decade, and was only recently released to the open source community.

Read more about the acquisition and what it means for Hortonworks here.

Best Buy expands Apple Watch sales to all stores

Despite reports that the Apple Watch is a flop (see below), Best Buy Co. Inc. announced that the device and its accessories will be available on all of its stores with claims that there is a strong demand from consumers both from its physical and online stores. The Apple Watch is expected to become available in all 1,050 Best Buys stores nationwide by the end of September.

Read more about Best Buy’s effort to push the Apple Watch here.

New wearable tracker aims to keep skin healthy

Raymio, a new wearable tracker that helps users monitor how much sun they have been exposed to or should be exposed to, will be debuting on Kickstarter tomorrow, September 1, 2015, aiming to sell 1,000 units.

Also featured in this roundup is Kindara raising $5.3 million for its fertility monitor.

Read more about these products in our Smart Health roundup.

IDC report shows Apple Watch still a flop

Though some in the media tout the Apple Watch as a success, a new report from the International Data Corporation reveals that is not entirely the case. According to the report, the Apple Watch lags about 800,000 units behind Fitbit, Inc. in sales. It was not clear as to when most of the Apple Watch were sold. It’s still hard to tell whether the Apple Watch is a flop or a success until Apple itself reveals its numbers.

Read more about IDC’s report here.

Top smart cities in Canada, India and beyond

India has released a partial list of cities that will be participating in its 100 Smart Cities project and Canada is seen as leading the deployment in smart infrastructure. If India and Canada are highly investing in smart city infrastructures, Australia may still be contemplating on this as Professor Bob Williamson, CEO of NICTA, Australia’s Information and Communications Technology Research Centre of Excellence, is trying to convince the government of smart city benefits.

Also featured in this roundup is the addition of a smart city feature at Ecobuild 2016.

Read more about these developments in our Smart City roundup.  

Tune in next week for more interesting stories, discoveries and innovations in the world of smart and connected things.

Photo by Royal Philips