Handset form-factors of the future

We’ll get a glimpse of what the future of the smartphone market has to offer starting at the Mobile World Congress tomorrow.  Here we analyse the trends so far and their affect on the market place and their possible direction in the long run.

The release of the iPhone has revolutionized the overall design of mobile phones in terms of form factors. All of a sudden every manufacturer and platform was flooded with handsets with:

Larger screens, leaving less bevelsCapacitive touch screensBetter multimedia featuresLess physical buttons / keysHowever, four years later we seem to be at lost at innovation again. I am not so sure where to expect the next big thing from. It is going to be a very bold move to challenge a change in form factor, but at the same time a need for a successful launch all the same.What should we expect or to rephrase what does the consumer require while being unable to clearly ask for it to get more out of their mobile devices? In my opinion there are two very distinct paths to follow.The tech savvy approachThe slow and steady approachThe tech savvy would probably be coming out of a science fiction movie with HUD displays projected on to thin air or via specialized glasses for privacy reason, a similar approach for audio could be as complex as implants or as simple as existing bluetooth or wired earphones. This throws translucent glass bricks ideas, etc. out of the windows because when the device has no direct user interface, it could be as ugly as a piece of coal for all we care, you would probably never take it out of your pocket so does not really matter.However, the issue for the consumer would be a giant leap into technology for which we might not be ready at the moment. Hence, the slow and steady might be a safer approach but if too many manufacturers are targeting the same goal with a slightly different pace, it might not win the battle for any particular one.Using more space on the front of the device for the screenUsing more on the screen rather off it in the form of buttons or keysAdding more memory and storage has helped hybrid nature of devicesConsumer speaking to the deviceThe device speaking to a consumerAutomating one’s life with the help of a deviceRelying on battery powered devices

In the end it all boils down to what manufacturers are willing to risk and their marketing departments expect to be able to sell in huge volumes. With the Samsung Galaxy series of phones selling in the vicinity of 20 million devices, it does not look likely for them to drastically change the form factors and it is very evident that the success with the larger sibling “Note” is not compelling enough for more tries in the future to combine tablets with phones.

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