Will, Could Kopin be involved with this Samsung product?.....
Samsung Unveils Smallest Internet Phone
SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Tuesday unveiled what it called
the world's smallest Internet cellular phone, capable of accessing and
displaying information from the Internet.
Weighing 5.5 oz, the "smart phone" has a 1.1 inch to 2.7 inch touch
screen panel, which offers "touch mail" capability to send text messages
and pictures.
"Using wireless data service, the smart phone is a product where people
can get information wherever and whenever they want," said Jeung
Soon-hyo, principal engineer at Samsung Electronic's Multimedia Lab.
"This is the world's smallest and lightest phone using CDMA (code
division multiple access) technology," he said at a news conference to
introduce the product.
The Internet phone was developed to stimulate slumping sales in Korea
due to market saturation, Samsung officials said.
Samsung expects 18.5 million Koreans, more than a third of the
population, will own cellular phones by the end of this year. Its
primary target market is young people in their 20s and 30s.
A standard Internet protocol is built in so the phone can access the
Internet without having to first be connected with a notebook PC.
It can handle 2,000 stored addresses, schedules for up to one year and
as many as 100 memos at a time. There are English-Korean, Korean-English
dictionaries and an engineering calculator that does trigonometry,
exponential functions and statistics.
The phone also features a Bible, hymnal, Buddhist Canon and songbook as
well as electronic games.
Samsung officials said the price has not been fixed yet but expect it
would cost 100,000 to 150,000 won ($82-$123) more than Samsung's current
cellular phones.
Samsung aims to sell about 100 million Internet phones in Korea and
abroad this year, when the phones begin sales in April.
In 1998, Samsung had a 3.7 percent share of the world market, selling
7.4 million wireless mobile phones at home and abroad.
Samsung Electronics also displayed another of its inventions, the "watch
phone". Combining a wristwatch and a phone, it has been immediately
dubbed the "007 phone" because of its similarity to one James Bond used
in the movie "Golden Eyes."
"Japan made a watch phone similar to this but didn't succeed in
commercializing," Jeung said. "Samsung's watch phone is the world's
first to be commercialized and will begin sales in April." |
