Despite Samsung’s efforts to put a lid on leaks about its upcoming projects, the flow of rumors have not stopped. One of Samsung’s most anticipated project is prototypes of foldable smartphones which, as per past leaks, should make it to the market by Q3 of this year. Now another leak has emerged which paints a contradictory picture suggesting that Samsung’s first foldable phone, purportedly named Galaxy X, will not release in 2017.
A senior researcher working on Samsung’s flexible display project, on condition of anonymity, spilled the beans stating that ‘there are still many technical trade-offs to make and difficulties to overcome’ before releasing the foldable smartphone. And after the Note 7 fiasco, Samsung is in no mood to become the target of another brouhaha by cooking something in a hurry and spreading it on the table for commercial use.
“Samsung Display has conducted a range of projects for rollable and foldable displays at its lab since 2005. After almost a decade since the company first succeeded in folding a functioning display in 2008, the foldable display has not been commercialized yet, which means there are still many technical trade-offs to make and difficulties to overcome,” The Investor quoted the senior researcher as saying.
Read: Galaxy X: New Samsung patent gives us clear view of foldable device
The technical trade-offs as cited by the researcher involves combining durability and flexibility in a foldable phone. The phone should be flexible enough to be folded which cannot be achieved ifs durability in enhanced making it rigid. If durability is compromised, a phone’s market value diminishes.
Other problems which need to be tackled is ‘decoupling’ of display panels, thickness, embedding different display sensors in the foldable display.
The Investor also quoted Samsung Electronics Koh Dong-jin as commenting in August last year that ‘more time is needed for Samsung Electronics to unveil a foldable smartphone to offer meaningful innovations and true convenience to users.’
Keeping all these mind, it seems that Samsung definitely does not want to take any chances this time and wants to be fully sure before it commercially releases ts first foldable smartphone Galaxy X.
via The Investor
