Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Samsung To Launch Smartphones With Bendable Screens in 2017, Reports Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)

Posted by msmash on from the well-that's-at-least-unique dept.

Samsung plans to launch two smartphones with bendable screens. The South Korean technology conglomerate could showcase these two phones as early as the Mobile World Congress tradeshow next year, according to Bloomberg, which cites sources "familiar with the matter." The publication adds that one of the phones will fold in half like a makeup compact, whereas the other with a 5-inch display would fold out into a larger tablet-style device. From the report: The devices using organic light-emitting diodes could be unveiled as soon as early 2017. That would likely give it a head start on new Apple Inc. iPhones. The second Samsung model will have a 5-inch screen when used as a handset, that unfurls into a display that's as large as 8 inches, similar to a tablet, the people said.As for more immediate future plans, the Galaxy Note 6, which is expected to launch later this year, might ship with the moniker "Note 7". This would allow Samsung to put its flagship phablet's branding in line with its current smartphone numbering. Samsung launched the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge earlier this year. (Editor's note: Bloomberg website, though very credible, has pop-up videos, which some of you may find annoying. Just in case, here's an alternate source.)

11 of 65 comments (clear)

  1. Will they have one... by EzInKy · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ...that doesn't "phone home"?

    --
    Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
    1. Re:Will they have one... by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      Phone home where? Samsung phones can be setup without a Google account, and without a Samsung account. The only phoning home that has been observed has been to check for updates.

      Now do you have some evidence to the contrary?

  2. In other news.. by SuneSpeg · · Score: 3, Funny

    Apple To Launch Smartphones With Bendable Screens in 2018, Reports hipsters

    1. Re:In other news.. by Flavianoep · · Score: 4, Funny

      You're late. IPhone 6, which was launched in 2014, was bendable.

      --
      Linux is for people who don't mind RTFM.
  3. Bloomberg website is spammy by FudRucker · · Score: 3, Interesting

    whoever submitted this needs to find cleaner sources for their interests, Bloomberg really sucks!!!

    --
    Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
  4. Fold-able is NOT Bendable by moehoward · · Score: 4, Informative

    The idea that Samsung is trying is fold-able screens which have a curved separate display in the middle of the fold. Much like the S7 Edge has curved separate displays at the edges that are really separate. It looks like one screen but is not. Same here, they will have multiple screens joined in the middle at the fold by a curved screen. So, no part of the screen actually moves. Sort of an illusion combined with marketing-speak.

    Nothing new to see here. Please move along....

    --
    "If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid." - Epictetus
    1. Re:Fold-able is NOT Bendable by dave420 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Nothing new apart from that this hasn't been done before...

    2. Re:Fold-able is NOT Bendable by tlhIngan · · Score: 2

      Yeah, I don't really trust flexible screens, after seeing them in action. They seem way too fragile and after a few hundred open/close cycles a lot start losing rows or columns of pixels as their driver line detaches from the screen from the repeated folding/unfolding.

      Sure with a high-res display it may not be noticeable, but probably after a year it will be quite easy to see there's missing elements.

  5. Apple to launch iPhone w/bendable screens in 2018 by kimvette · · Score: 2, Funny

    Apple's research division Samsung's efforts will result in a bendable-screen iPhone in 2018. ;)

    --
    The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
  6. Re:Why all the excitement... by aicrules · · Score: 2

    because of how fun it is to hang up on someone with a flip phone. CLAP! done

  7. Ugh, NO! by Dracos · · Score: 2

    Stop putting useless features and overspec'd hardware in phones to maintain your price points. No one needs a 36 megapixel camera. No one really wants a 6mm thick phone, they want battery capacity which requires.... volume and thickness! They want RAM and processing power.

    Some of us want features we can't get anymore, like full QWERTY keyboards. Some of us know that onscreen keyboards suck on principle.

    If you're willing to make a flipbendy phone, you should be willing to make slider phones again: Full keyboard, 12Mpx camera, Snapdragon 820, removeable SD card and battery. It's not too much to ask.