Concept images of a Huawei rollable phone
Sketches from Huawei’s patent in 2020
The mysterious device first appeared on our radar back in April 2020, when Huawei submitted a patent application for a future smartphone with a sliding display. This patent, pictured above, has since evolved into an even better design and has just made a sudden reappearance yesterday, showing improved functionality and some neat solutions to potential issues.
The improved design was published in the 21-page documentation of a new patent, for which Huawei Technologies had filed with WIPO (the World Intellectual Property Office) on the last day of January 2021.
The new patent contains plenty of detail about how the roll-out technology is going to work, focusing particularly on avoiding potential creasing. Huawei aims to do this with two strategically placed magnets, above and below the roller which unravels the smartphone into a larger tablet on command. The magnets will pull the display flat down as it rolls out, and keep it from shifting.
The roller itself is between the magnets and reaches just a tad beyond them into the housing, to make sure there isn’t any unnecessary friction happening and that the wheel can perform its job unimpeded, while the magnets ensure that the screen is flat and uncreased—whether it is in a folded or unfolded position.
Apart from the “rolled-in” (6.5-inch smartphone) position, and the “rolled-out” (11-inch tablet) position, Huawei will include a middle, partly-rolled-out position, in which the device remains bigger than a smartphone but still comfortably compact. The maximally rolled-out position gives about 70% more surface area than the minimal smartphone position.
Naturally, in tablet position, there will only be one large front screen, but when rolled back into a regular-sized smartphone, both the front and back panels will feature a functioning display (although what degree of functionality the back smartphone screen will enjoy, we can only surmise).
