Samsung Launching Flexible Smartphones Soon

Samsung understands that people use their smartphones now as not only a communication device but an accessory too. Whatever will sensible and chic smartphone accessorizers do now that the company has unveiled the flexible, bendable AMOLED models?

Unleashed in hush-hush manner at the International CES 2014 tradeshow, Samsung’s 5.68-inch, AMOLED screen makes use of its plastic substrate, liquid crystal construction to be not just high-resolution and paper-thin but completely bendable, according to OLED-Display.

This is an improvement over Samsung’s Galaxy Round phones, which had film made of indium tin oxide that wouldn’t allow for flexibility. The new film is made of a metal mesh that allows for bending without breaking.

Though Samsung unleashed the technology as only a prototype, company officials did hint at a possible release by Christmas 2014 or soon thereafter. The AMOLED technology, which stands for Active Matrix Organic Light Emitting Diode, has been flashed before the masses for a few years now, offering the tech-crazy masses better resolution, wider viewing angles and more durable construction. Now it seems the craze with AMOLED is what companies like Samsung are pushing forth, not just with bendable smartphones but also tablets and full-size televisions.

The time is now. Ecumenical News notes that Samsung plans to launch its new line, the Samsung Galaxy Note 4, a series of smartphones and phablets, complete with bendable screens soon. It’s calling the new bendable feature “Youm.”

According to EN’s reviewer Art Villasanta, the new Notes 4 line will offer something completely different from anything on the market up until now:

The three-sided Youm flexible OLED display will allow the Galaxy Note 4 to use the left and right sides of the screen to show notifications for calls, emails and other functions. It will also enable users to controls apps, and to lock or unlock their phones. Youm should allow the use of virtual buttons that will make it easier to tab through files or pictures sorted alphabetically or by year.

Though some think of bendable as simply folding, as in half along the same crease every time, but these Samsung phones will actually be much more flexible than that. Imagine a phone jutting out of a back pocket and rolling over the pocket lip and back down again, like the most expensive candy cane ever licked.

And expect the technology to show up in more than just the obvious places. According to a report on the development by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a new generation of displays is on the way in the coming few years that will change the look of computer monitors, videophones, camcorders, sat-nav systems and even video game machines.

See the phone in action here:

[Image courtesy of Samsung]