14 DAY TRIAL // We thought that the Gear 2 and Gear Fit would be the last things we'd hear about Samsung smartwatches, for a few months anyway, but that doesn't seem to be the case with what has just shown up in the USPTO data banks.
USPTO is short of US Patent and Trademark Office and it is where everyone files applications for new intellectual property.
The IP is classified in patents, each patent describing a product or technology that one wishes to have ownership of.
It helps companies and people stake a claim on an idea, give themselves time to act on a project, and get payments when asked to license their tech (allow others to use it as it were).
Samsung has just filed a patent, one that builds on its ongoing efforts to come up with newer and better display devices.
In the newest filing, Samsung describes (as found by Patent Bolt) a wraparound watch flexible display. It may very well be the most advanced form of flexible display yet.
It's supposed to be able to wrap around a person's wrist and become the smartwatch. Somehow, Samsung wants to make the other electronic parts small and thin enough, maybe flexible enough themselves, to allow for such a thing.
We imagine that the company won't even bother trying to make the display transparent. It will be hard enough to build the other electrical parts in the strap behind the screen without finding some way to render them see-through as well.
There are some other patents on USPTO now, also belonging to Samsung. There is one for a display with two-fold structure, which can fold out into a larger screen. There's also a display that can't change shape at all but which can act as a kickstand.
We imagine that these two will be stepping stones, of sorts, on the way to a truly rollable wrist screen. Samsung will probably use the screen technologies for things besides wearable gadgets as well. The one that doubles as a kickstand will probably land in tablets, if nothing else.
Now we just need to wait and see how long the foldable panel goes before the line of wear starts to appear in the middle, where the fold always happens. At least the wraparound panel has an advantage there: the wear is spread all over the surface, and mitigated by elasticity. Alas, we're not sure what kind of panel substrate Samsung has in mind, so we can't tell how elastic and self-healing the screen will be.
