Wearable technology has been highly regarded as a revolutionary tech of the future. Smartwatches which fall in this category on the other hand are making very little progress in appealing to consumers. Companies like Pebble had to give up their smartwatch business in 2016 to escape debt (and were acquired by Fitbit). Bigger brands like Samsung however are still investing highly on smartwatches and the Gear S2’s success and popularity is an example for that. The Gear S3 and the Gear Fit 2 are currently carrying the torch forward for the company with some innovative features embedded into them. Samsung have also steered clear from Android wear for its wearables and are banking highly on Tizen to serve the purpose.
Smartwatches, irrespective of brands still don’t seem to have a compelling reason to make way on to every person’s wrist in the same way as Smartphones have found their place in everybody’s pockets. The ease of use and limited feature-set can be blamed as one of the reason for this. And hence companies are going back to the drawing board to see where it all went wrong. One such attempt from Samsung which was being filed for a patent application has now surfaced online.
Samsung’s vision here is to design a “Smart Strap” of some sorts which will act as a method of controlling the smartwatch’s interface just by pulling it with your finger which translates to a pre-defined task. The strap is likely to have embedded electronics which can output variable data when it is deformed, stretched, bent etc. Samsung further details this technology to be implemented into a wearable remote that can be worn around a user’s neck and control other electronics like TV, switches, gaming console, etc.
In another patent application, Samsung lists out a bendable display which can be worn around a user’s wrist. The display has a flexible body to support it which helps it to transform back into a flat screen like current smartphones. This concept is similar to Lenovo’s wearable concept smartphone which was showcased back in June, 2016.
Whether these patent concepts will actually make into a consumer product isn’t something we can guarantee, as brands like Samsung have filed such numerous patents in the past but never saw the light of the day in an actual device.
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