The world's first smartphone for blind people is here. Soon,
they will be able to read SMSes and emails on this phone, which converts
all text into Braille patterns.
(The world's first smartphone…)
"We have created the
world's first Braille smartphone," says its innovator, Sumit Dagar,
whose company is being incubated at the Centre for Innovation Incubation
and Entrepreneurship,
located in IIM Ahmedabad campus. "This product is based on an
innovative 'touch screen' which is capable of elevating and depressing
the contents it receives to transform them into 'touchable' patterns,"
he says.
Dagar, who is a post-graduate from the National
Institute of Design (NID), says he was motivated to develop the device
when he realised that so far, technology was only serving the mainstream
and ignoring the marginalised. He is collaborating with IIT Delhi on
making the prototype, which is currently being tested at L V Prasad Eye
Institute in Hyderabad.
"The response during the test has been
immense. It comes out as a companion more than a phone to the user. We
plan to do more advanced versions of the phone in the future," Dagar
adds.
Dagar started the project three years ago while studying
interaction designing at NID. After working with a couple of companies,
he gave up his job to concentrate on his technology, formed a team of
six people and started his venture, Kriyate Design Solutions. Currently,
the venture is being funded by Rolex
Awards under its Young Laureates Programme, in which they select five
people from across the world every two years and fund their projects.
How it works
· The smartphone uses Shape Memory Alloy technology, based on the
concept that metals remember their original shapes, i.e. expand and
contract to its original shape after use.
· The phone's 'screen'
has a grid of pins, which move up and down as per requirement. The grid
has a Braille display, where pins come up to represent a character or
letter.
· This screen will be capable of elevating and depressing the contents to form patterns in Braille.
· All other elements are like any other smartphone.
Source : Times of india , Ahemadabad ( 19th April 2013)
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