Throw Away That Cell Phone
nytimes.com
We may live in a disposable society, but is the world ready for throwaway cell
phones? Randice-Lisa Altschul thinks so.
Ms. Altschul, a full-time inventor in Cliffside Park, N.J., has patented a technology that
she says can be used to manufacture cellular phones so inexpensively that they could be
sold for a fixed amount of air time -- as long-distance calling cards are -- and then tossed in
the garbage once their minutes have been used up.
Ms. Altschul, with the help of consulting engineers,
essentially took a flexible circuit, which forms the
innards of many cell phones today, and elongated it.
This, she says, enables the flex circuit to be folded back
upon itself, much like a large ribbon, thereby
eliminating the need for most of the plastic housing
found in other cell phones.
"The circuit itself becomes the body of the unit," Ms.
Altschul said. "And it becomes its own built-in
tamper-proof system because as soon as you cut it
open, you break the circuits and the phone goes dead."
Moreover, she contends, her technology can be used to
greatly reduce the costs of manufacturing any
electronic device that uses a flexible circuit.
Patent 5,965,848 was granted in October to Ms.
Altschul and Lee Volte, a former senior vice president
for research and development at the toy maker, Tyco.
Ms. Altschul, 39, hit her first invention home run when she was 25. She had created a
cops-vs.-cocaine-dealers game that took place on a map of Miami, and she persuaded the
executive producer of the "Miami Vice" television series to let her call it the Miami Vice
Game. Since then, Ms. Altschul has invented numerous other games, most notably Barbie's
30th Birthday Game.
She has also recently patented other children's gear. Applause Inc. is selling her patented
stuffed animals, which feature pocketlike arms into which children can insert their arms.
These enable the child to wave the stuffed animal's arms or to make it seem as if the animal
is capable of giving hugs.
And Ms. Altschul is looking to license her "interactive cereal" -- cereal sculpted into
monster shapes that crumple into soggy heaps when doused with milk.
So how did a toy-and-game inventor come to think up a new cellular phone technology?
"I was driving in my car, and I kept losing my cell signal, and I wanted to throw my phone
out the window. And -- bingo -- I came up with the idea," Ms. Altschul said. She
immediately called her patent lawyer to see whether anyone else had patented such an idea.
No one had.
"The greatest asset I have over everyone else in that business is my toy mentality," she
said. "An engineer's mentality is to make something last, to make it durable. A toy's life
span is about an hour, then the kid throws it away. You get it, you play with it and --
boom -- it's gone."
Indeed, Ms. Altschul says her phone, which wouldn't require any entangling contracts or
billing agreements, would appeal primarily to children, to harried mothers and to travelers
who don't want to have to worry about keeping track of yet another expensive electronic
device.
She estimates that a phone with 60 minutes of air time could be produced for about $14 and
would retail for about $20 -- perhaps not through normal retail channels, but, rather, as a
marketing gimmick. To lure more lunch customers, for example, a restaurant like
McDonald's might sell, at cost, a phone imprinted with the golden arches logo.
"It's the ultimate in-your-face advertising," Ms. Altschul said.
For that kind of money, though, don't expect any frills. The phone, powered by a six-volt
battery, works for outgoing calls only, and it doesn't have a liquid crystal display.
Ms. Altschul said the same technology could be used for a host of electronic devices, from
hand-held electronic games to programmable fast-food debit cards.
One of these might be a card sold for use with state lotteries or given away by casinos as
promotional freebies. "It's basically a slot machine in your pocket," she said.
She also says her cellular phone could double as a credit card when it has a magnetic strip
built into it.
"The customer could swipe the phone instead of a credit card and upon approval of his
purchase receive instant gratification in the form of more free air time," Ms. Altschul said.
"The more he uses his cell phone as a credit card, the more air time he will get."
This would, of course, require an arrangement between retailers, cellular service providers
and a credit card company. It would require a longer-lasting power source than the
60-minute battery Ms. Altschul envisions with the purely disposable cell phone.
Ms. Altschul says she comes up with as many as 20 to 30 new ideas a week, but for the
moment she is focusing most of her efforts on the phone and its various manifestations.
So far she has sunk more than $1 million of her own money into the project. "I'm talking to
investors," she said. "I'm at the point where I need the guys with deeper pockets.
Everything I own is on the line for this project." |
