How soon to the flexible form factor? Some flex signals from the past few days.

KEY MOBILE TRENDS: form factors, flexible, materials, displays, follow the components.
EVENT HORIZON: five years.

For your consideration:

-LG could beat Samsung to market with commercial flexible displays >>
-Apple Patent Reveals Advanced iDevice Flex Display Features >>
-Apple job listing for 'flexible display' engineer >>
-Flexible keyboard, clickable buttons >>

Back in the year 2000 I saw a really nice, super sharp color mobile display at an industry trade show. However, I didn't see any mainstream phone with a screen like that until around 2005. That's an example of the time gap from component demos to store-shelf ready implementation.

Yes, companies that design components begin hocking their wares years before they will implemented in products. In fact, they start showing off working and non-working prototypes behind the curtains in deep non-disclosure agreement meetings. Ordinary folks like us don't get a peak until development work is nearly complete. And then it still takes years and years for real products to hit the streets. There are few surprises for industry insiders.

Now we're getting to a point where flexibility is getting close. How close? From experience, I would say five years until some mainstream product hits a mall near you. The displays are getting there, the batteries, some of the guts. We could start to see modularity, with wrap-around displays here and there a bit sooner.

There is hope: the most boring market in the world will become more flexible someday. For now, however, the world remains flat.

Another look at Samsung's YOUM flexible display technology happy, pretty people video:


image via Patently Apple:

Battery stretch. This flexible, stretchable battery technology could enable some wild form factors.

STORY via NEUROGADGET >>

KEY TRENDS: Flexible design, new form factors, "Follow the components," healthcare, wearable computing

Get ready for some more flexibility in design.

Samsung, Sony, Corning and other display component vendors have been showing their enablers for flexible smartphone screens for several years. These make for fun demo products at industry trade shows, but won't result in any real-world form factor changes until other components can bend as well.

So, here we have a bendable battery. Researchers at Northwestern University in the U.S. are showing a stretchable lithium-ion battery. The battery could be placed inside a device, or inside a human body. It can be charged via inductive coupling which would allow it to be placed in some odd places indeed.

Of course these are early days and this is still a laboratory demo. But now is the time for designers to think ahead and stretch their imaginations. The definition of what a device is and where it will be is evolving quickly. Get ready for powerful changes ahead.

Will stretchable battery technology enable tinkering outside the box?

Image via NEUROGADGET.

Samsung bends the rules. Flexible screen technology demos via Samsung CES 2013.

The earth is not flat, do not forget that.

Black rectangular screen, black rectangular screen, black rectangular screen, black rectangular screen, black rectangular screen, cool foldable big-screen device you can spread out, black rectangular screen, black rectangular screen, black rectangular screen, bla... whao, what was that?

Was that something different in the world's most boring market filled with look-alike products? Could it be? Could things be about to change?

I would have more hope and be less cynical had I not seen similar presentations year after year. But these things do take time. Here's some hope from the display component guys at Samsung. Device makers looking for some WOW, higher margins, and lines out the door: get on your marks, get set, bend.

Fold it away boys:
(WARNING: the second video below is one of those visionary beautiful-people types.)

Thanks to MB for the links.

Flexibility in design: Will Samsung be flexible during 2013? And if phones screens do get softer, will it be just a curiosity?

We've been seeing flexible display components for many years now. Will 2013 be the year they finally get used in some truly innovative ways? Fingers crossed.

When it comes to device form factors, the smartphone business is a snoozer. More than 90% of devices on the market look essentially the same. And let's be honest, they work the same as well.

What happened to the excitement of future innovations? I've seen some pretty cool device prototypes and concepts during my career. Sadly, I suppose most of these are collecting dust in storage boxes somewhere, and others are used as very expensive paperweights.

So, will 2013 be the year of something just a little bit fresh? Maybe. Samsung is expected to show some sort of prototype device using their own flexible screen components. Whether this will be a technology display to interest other handset vendors in their displays or a working Android smartphone from Samsung's mobile unit isn't clear. But we'll see the light soon at CES.

We've been seeing these flexible screens from Samsung, Sony, Toshiba, 3M and other component vendors for approximately four years now. The bigger question is how useful are these if all the other building blocks of a handset are stiff as a board? Would a handset that conforms to the inside of your pocket be a subtle solution to a slight problem? Now it's up to designers and software engineers to think outside the block.

And let's face it, this is what we're all waiting for:

Squeezeput. Is 3D input coming our way? Will depth soon become the new angle in UI? The pressure is on for something fresh in smartphone form factors.

GIZMODO STORY >>

I recently got a quick peek at a prototype of a smartphone expected to hit the market in the coming weeks. I don't want to give too much away, but I suspect you already know exactly what it's like (a black, rectangular capacitive touch screen).

In the smartphone biz, there are no longer any rewards for hardware innovation. Follow the form-factor flock in a V formation and you just might make it to your destination alive. I do hope some day a lone eagle will come along and shake up what has become the most boring market in the world. Even the market for rather boring white goods such as washing machines and refrigerators has greater variety in form factors than the smartphone market. That's where we are today.

Looking for something new and fresh? Check out NTT DoCoMo's "Grip UI" shown recently at CEATEC 2012. In addition to classic touch-screen input, the proto device supports pressure-sensitive input from the sides enhancing one-handed usability.

I've seen demos and protos of squeezable pressure-sensitive devices for a number of years now as component vendors look to create a hot new wave among vendors. There doesn't look like much form-factor flexibility in the near future; these things take time, but at some point the market will bend under pressure.


NTT DoCoMo's Grip UI. Something fresh. You can say that again.
Video from DigInfo:


Nokia's shows flexibility in design:


Synaptics "Fuse" concept from February 2010. Input all around:

More on being flexible: Corning's new "Willow Glass" is tough but flexible.

PCMAG STORY >>

CORNING PR >>

Are flexible, rollable, even bendable devices just around the corner? No. But the components are.

It's nice to see the enablers falling into place for future form factor devices. These flat, touch-only devices are all looking and acting alike -- and it's getting boring.

Here's Corning's Willow Glass. It's Gorilla Glass for the flexible generation. It's tough and it's flexible.

Which vendor will be the first to bring some wow to the market with something a bit different?

Tongue in cheek: on the radar. I have a sinking feeling this isn't going to end well.

[ Thanks to Jesper Z. M. for spotting this one. ]

File this one under "Arrogance."

You're a big, powerful corporation. Flexibility? Nah. That's for the weak. Your momentum is all you need to command you forward. You plan to crush anything and everything in your path.

But what's this coming your way? Doesn't matter. It's no match. It is but a speck compared to you. Full steam ahead. And roll the tape:

Samsung shows flexibility. Samsung augments reality with this fun video.

Let's not be completely taken in with such slight-of-hand videos. But these are usually a fun way to envision things that might be.

Samsung's transparent, flexible display.

Sure, we've seen these highly optimistic videos before. They tend to be so transparent. But that's OK. Keep dreaming:

On the verge of being flexible. Samsung promises flexible displays during 2012.

Via KOREAN HERALD >>

What form factor changes will flexible screens bring about? More wearable computing? Displays in backpacks and knickknacks?

Start your imaginations. Samsung promises to start supplying flexible displays during 2012, and while this might not change the boring flat, black form factor that has become so ubiquitous in the smartphone market, it could lead to displays used in very new ways.

Remember, Samsung isn’t just the world’s largest vendor of smartphones, Samsung Electronics is also a key component supplier selling displays and memory and lots of other gut parts.


Robert Yi, Samsung Electronics Vice President of investor relations: “We’re looking to roll out flexible displays sometime in 2012, hopefully the earlier part rather than the latter.”

Maybe flex is the next touch. Nokia flexes some muscle with this prototype device.

via IntoMobile >>

Talk about twist and shout.

OK, prototypes are what they are: prototypes. They’re mouth-watering technology demos sometimes miles away from reality. They create some excitement, curiosity, and even envy. I’ve seen my share. But then they disappear.

So, here we something a bit different from Nokia: the use of a flexible display for input. Flexible displays is one of those inspirational technology enablers that we’ve seen pop up now and again during the past five years, but never make it on any mainstream device. (The thought of a roll-up or foldable large-screen device is something many of us are waiting for.)

So, Nokia's "Kinetic Device" is a crowd-pleaser if nothing else. I read in one interview that Nokia thinks that such devices could come to market for real and “hopefully soon.” That would be a stretch. But then again, perhaps Nokia is really becoming a more flexible organization.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsbZOKahdMw