Samsung Unveils Foldable Smartphone Screen
08 November, 2018
Samsung on Wednesday unveiled a latest foldable smartphone screen and other gadgets like machine-learning software.
The foldable screen Samsung unveiled at an event in San Francisco replaces the traditional glass screen with a new type of plastic that can be folded hundreds of thousands of times without losing its functionality.
Samsung plans to unveil its first foldable smartphone, the tentatively named Galaxy F, next year, the 10th anniversary of its flagship Galaxy S series.
The Korean electronics giant hopes to regain the No. 1 spot in the global smartphone market currently dominated by rival Apple's high-end handsets as Chinese rivals Huawei, Xiaomi and OPPO catch up with cheaper products.
The world's first foldable smartphone, Flexpai, was unveiled late last month by a Chinese start-up called Royole. But Samsung's Infinity Flex is a more sophisticated display which looks like two smartphone screens folded into one. It measures 4 inches when folded but turns into a tablet PC screen measuring 7.3 inches when unfolded.
Samsung also developed a new type of adhesive that can withstand repeated folding and said it made the screen thin enough to put in a pocket. The company said it has already solved all the technological problems and is in the final stage of development before mass production.
But it did not unveil a prototype foldable smartphone, as some had expected. Instead, it only featured screenshots of an Android operating system for foldable phones that it is developing with Google.
"The screen layout and usage of foldable smartphones will be completely different from existing smartphones," a spokesman said. "We unveiled the screen first to show developers around the world the shape so they can prepare more apps and services."
Samsung hopes to launch the Galaxy F at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas next January or at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February.
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