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Are invisible phones in our future?

By | February 12, 2013, 4:00 AM PST

If you have problems losing your phone you might not like this news. Polytron, a Taiwanese manufacturer of “electronic and optical vision glass” believes we could see a transparent smartphone as early as later this year.

The prototype that the company demoed for MIS Asia was not yet functional as a phone but showed off the hardware for an invisible phone. And while you can see the battery, camera, and memory card, the rest of the phone is see-through with nearly invisible wires sandwiched between two pieces of glass.

So what exactly is the purpose of a nearly invisible phone? Sam Yu, Polytron’s general manager, tells MIS Asia:

“I like things that are novel and look beautiful,” he said, adding that the patent for the technology was developed four years ago. “Current mobile phones are heavier, but with this glass you can make it much lighter.”

Yu also says that phone manufacturers are looking to use the product but declined to say which ones. No word on whether or not the phone is shatter-proof.

Photo: Youtube

[Via Discovery News, MIS Asia]

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Tyler Falk

About Tyler Falk

Tyler Falk is a contributing editor for SmartPlanet.

Tyler Falk

Tyler Falk

Contributing Editor

Tyler Falk freelance journalist based in Washington, D.C. Previously, he was with Smart Growth America and Grist. He holds a degree from Goshen College.

Follow him on Twitter.

Tyler Falk

Tyler Falk

Tyler does not have financial holdings that would influence how or what he covers.

He writes for SmartPlanet and is not an employee of CBS.

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+3 Votes
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Star Trek
Getting Closer and Closer to Transparent Aluminum. "Computer- Computer"
Posted by rcmarcotte
12th Feb
+3 Votes
+ -
Puhleeeeeze
Transparent IS NOT in any way shape or form invisible
Posted by tjsobieski@...
12th Feb
+1 Vote
+ -
Glass breaks
Glass breaks and it doesn't look like it would be repairable, just a throwaway. Might be a market for it if the price were cheap enough.
Posted by daliere@...
12th Feb
+2 Votes
+ -
Technically, phones are already invisible,
and what people carry around with them, are smartphones and feature-phones, which are, for all intents and purposes, personal digital assistants and hand-held computing devices, which contain phone capabilities, which are "invisible" to the user, and are, nowadays, more like afterthoughts rather than the main feature.
Posted by adornoe
12th Feb
0 Votes
+ -
Anyone seen a phone battery?
The battery will kill the idea of a transparent phone. In the picture, it had two tiny batteries, but how long would that run your modern quad core phone? Instead, you'd have a large battery that takes up about half the size of the phone.

Lastly, what happens when you drop this phone? It shatters into pieces. I'd be willing to bet that even my Nexus 4 would survive a drop better.
Posted by Patrick Aupperle
15th Feb
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