[reuters request] haptics and the future of force touch
Dear Subscriber, this is a blast to my trusted contacts hoping you can help on a story I'm doing about haptics and the future of responsive touch ahead of the Apple's expected introduction of force touch in its mobile devices next week.
I'm looking for insights on this space, including anyone, or data, or analysis that could address any of the following:
# Technology
Could you help break down the technology we're talking about here? We have vibration response, pressure-sensitivity, and then the illusion of a click -- the force touch bit (force based feedback?) I'm trying to understand here
- what's new
- what's old
- what's significant
- what the underlying components are (FPCs etc)
- what have been the major hurdles to this technology being deployed before, if any?
- what are the previous milestones on this path?
- which component makers have the edge on this? I'm particularly intrigued by Minebea, who seem to have some key components involved in this.
# Uses
Once I've got my head around that, I wanted to understand the usefulness, and potential uses, of this technology. Where might this take us?
# Competitors
Who else is in this game, and what are Apple's competitors doing in this space? Who has the patents? (And what terms might I look for in patent filings to get a sense of who might be in the game?)
- Huawei has announced inclusion of something similar in its devices. What are your views on that? Is this just a gimmick? Would this require tweaks to Android and/or Google's cooperation?
- Where is Samsung in all this, if anywhere?
- Is there likely to be a patent war over all this, given the reports of prior IP by BlackBerry et al? Are we talking apples and oranges here, or is there really some overlap?
Any help much appreciated. No need to reply if it's not your bailliwick.
Many thanks
Jeremy
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Jeremy Wagstaff
Chief Technology Correspondent, Asia
Chief Technology Correspondent, Asia
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