Posted on Tuesday, March 31 2009 @ 14:14 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
Moixa, the company behind the
USBCELL batteries, announced it was granted a patent on an apple sized multi-touch sphere concept. Such a device could be used to display the world (e.g. Google Earth), browse web pages or control interactive games.
London, 31st March 2009, Moixa, the UK based pioneers of folding keyboards and USBCELL re-usable batteries announced today that it has been awarded a patent GB2414309 on Sphere – a spherical hand-held display and control device. Sphere, which is the size and weight of an apple (and can also be recharged by opening a leaf like petal), can display an interactive world map (such as Google Earth), navigate the web or interact with applications. The device supports multi-touch interactions for zoom, selection, as well as 6 degree rotational and gyroscopic actions, with particular application in interactive games or complex control situations such as interacting with a nearby 3D screen or virtual space.
In Moixa tradition, Sphere can also be collaps
ed, used and stored in its second form - a flat ellipsoid. The patents, filed in 2004 also disclose advanced multi-touch surface interaction and gyroscopic control benefits.
Moixa founder Simon Daniel comments, "Sphere is part of an expanding IP portfolio of geometric forms that rethink the axioms of advanced portable computing. This started with cuboid folding keyboards, through flat/extendable mice and rollable screens to cylindrical re-usable batteries, and now spherical forms. In the future, phones and portable computing devices reduce to input/output and power. Sphere reinvents the look and feel of the advanced portable device as we rely more on services, memory and mapping stored on the web".
William Blake's insight captures the spirit of Sphere when he said 'To see a world in a grain of sand, and heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of your hand, and eternity in an hour'.
Sphere is under development for release 209 years after William Blakes's insight, in 2010 and is linked to the commercial availability of flexible screen materials. For license opportunities or to register interest in product updates, please visit moixa.com/sphere or moixadesign.com. Moixa pioneers portable devices and won a top 50 global iF Gold design award last year for pioneering sustainable USBCELL batteries (www.usbcell.com)
