In late January the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Samsung that revealed another evolutionary step towards a next-generation smartphone in the form of a watch-phone form factor with a very large flexible display. Samsung had to rethink how the antenna would be able to maintain a constant connection for mobile communications in such a form factor that involves folding and unfolding the watch-phone.
Evolutionary Phases: Samsung's Basic Smartphone Class Road Map
After the introduction of the phablet, it is expected that a mobile communication terminal device will evolve into a flexible phone that can be bent or folded. A flexible phone is classified into a watch phone, a foldable phone, and a bendable phone.
The "watch phone" is a phone that can be worn on the wrist of a user in the form of a watch, and commercialization of a smartwatch is expected in the course of time. Today the Guardian reviewed the Samsung Gear S which is in fact the "watch phone" Samsung is alluding to above.
One of the next iterations of a smartphone could be in the form of a "foldable phone" which is a phone having a plurality of folded bodies, and can be folded in various shapes depending on the intended use or purpose thereof.
Another iteration of a smartphone could be considered a "bendable phone" which is a phone where its body can be bent, and corresponds to a device generally referred to as a flexible phone.
The flexible phone may be configured in two states: a wearing state in which the flexible phone is worn and a shape of the flexible phone is changed and a release state in which the flexible phone is not worn.
The Next Phase of the Watch-Phone
Samsung's patent FIG. 1A illustrates a bendable phone #10 in a wearing state, and FIG. 1B illustrates a watch phone #20. The next phase for Samsung's Gear could be the form factor expanding beyond the display of a traditional watch with one that wraps around the wrist as noted below.
While trying to invent such an advanced bendable or flexible styled watch phone, Samsung notes that the shape change of the flexible phone may exert an influence on the performance of an antenna. That is, it has been found that an additional mode occurs due to coupling in a flexible phone that is bent or folded.
Samsung's patent FIG. 2 is a conceptual view illustrating a coupling phenomenon of a flexible phone that is in a bent state.
Samsung further notes that signal energy that is emitted from the antenna (#11 above) is excited to a system ground (#13 above) that forms a part of the antenna, and this excited signal energy causes the characteristic change of the antenna.
In other words, a kind of feedback loop is formed between the antenna and the ground, and this phenomenon is called an additional mode due to the coupling.
If the additional mode due to the coupling occurs, the antenna transmission and reception performance is lowered in comparison to the antenna transmission and reception performance in the case where the flexible phone isn't bent. So Samsung had to reinvent the system so as to strengthen the antenna for this next generation form factor.
Accordingly, Samsung's invention relates to one or more exemplary embodiments that provide a wireless communication device having a relatively consistent antenna performance even if the shape of the terminal device is changed from one that is flat to one that flexes around a wrist.
Samsung Invents New Flexible Grounds
In Samsung's patent FIG. 6 below we're able to see a view illustrating a wireless communication device having flexible grounds. The wireless communication device according to an exemplary embodiment as illustrated in FIG. 6 includes a flexible display #140, a first flexible ground portion #110, and a second flexible ground portion #120.
Samsung's patent FIG. 7 is a view illustrating a state where the wireless communication device of FIG. 6 is not bent.
As illustrated in FIG. 8 below we're able to see that Samsung has created an antenna system with multiple grounds compared to the original design of FIG. 2 above with a single ground.
In this case, the housing that accommodates the respective ground portions may be flexible, thus designed so that an impact is not applied to the ground portions therein even if the wireless communication device is bent. Such a design has the advantage that the increase of the manufacturing cost of the product is suppressed and a stable performance is secured.
In order to get a better understanding and overview of where Samsung may be going with this design/form factor, see our previous Patently Mobile (formerly Patent Bolt) reports here and here with more detail and graphics.
Samsung filed this flexible smartwatch/smartphone patent application back in the U.S. back in June 2014. Considering that this is a patent application, the timing of such a product to market is unknown at this time.
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