According to a report originating in China, Apple may be working on releasing a smartwatch in 2013.

The year 2012 was another one in which Apple defied market skeptics and delivered an unlikely hit, the iPad mini , in the face of stiff competition.

But it wouldn't be a normal Apple year without at least one last rumor to send us scratching our heads into the new year, anxiously wondering what the company has up its sleeve next. The latest rumor isn't necessarily earthshaking, but it is nevertheless surprising: Sources based in China claim that Apple is working on releasing a smartwatch.

According to a report on China's TGbus.com, the Bluetooth-enabled smartwatch will feature a 1.5-inch touchscreen display and work directly with the iPhone, allowing users to make phone calls and perform other operations from their wrists. First spotted by tech site TheNextWeb, the watch is supposedly a joint project between Apple and Intel.

This new talk of a smart watch might seem outlandish on its face, that is, until you begin to examine some of Apple's recent moves.

Earlier this year, Apple decided to update the iPod nano with a totally new design, one that instantly rendered obsolete iPod nano accessories that essentially turn the device into a kind of smartwatch. Kickstarter projects like the TikTok and LunaTik iPod nano watch straps had raised just shy of $1 million, proving that a healthy market exists for iPod nano owners who want to turn the music device into a kind of smartwatch.

So months later, when Apple inexplicably changed the design of the iPod nano to a form factor that many agree is something of a step backward, market speculation immediately focused on the notion that Apple might be attempting to displace would-be smartwatch competitors, and thus clear the table for its own, forthcoming smartwatch.

And then there's the much-anticipated . The upstart smartwatch company is famously listed as the most successful Kickstarter project ever, during its brief fund-raising period.

One other piece of related Apple news to consider is the company's recent deal with the Swiss Federal Railway. After the launch of iOS 6, the Swiss organization claimed that Apple had included its watch face design in the updated iPad operating system, thus violating the organization's trademark. The two parties soon that allowed Apple to license the iconic watch face design. Although terms of the agreement were not confirmed by either company, one Swiss news source claimed that Apple paid about $21 million for the license.

The notion that Apple would pay such a high price for the use of a simple watch face design inside iOS 6 that could have easily been changed raised quite a few eyebrows. But that move also serves as yet another hint that Apple may have bigger plans for that watch face design beyond using it as a mere component of iOS 6.

Apple itself has offered no direct indication that it's developing a smartwatch, but it would be a good idea to watch this space for more as it develops.