South Korea's Samsung and LG on Thursday launched rival smartwatches powered by Google's new software as they jostle to lead an increasingly competitive market for wearable devices seen as the mobile industry's next growth booster. Samsung's "Gear Live" and LG's "G Watch" -- both powered by Android Wear -- are the first devices to adopt the new Google software specifically designed for wearables. G Watch -- LG's first smartwatch -- is also equipped with Google's voice recognition service and can perform simple tasks including checking email, sending text messages and carrying out an online search at users' voice command. Samsung and LG are the world's top and fourth-largest smartphone maker, respectively.



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