WASHINGTON: The world’s first smartphone for the blind is being made in India by the country’s young and talented innovator Sumit Dagar at the Incubation center in Indian Institute of Management, Ahmadabad.
"We have created the world’s first Braille smartphone," said Dagar.
"This product is based on an innovative ‘touch screen’ which is capable of elevating and depressing the contents it receives to transform them into ‘touchable’ patterns."
He is collaborating with IIT Delhi on making the prototype, which is currently being tested at L V Prasad Eye Institute in Hyderabad.
"The response during the test has been immense.
It comes out as a companion more than a phone to the user.
We plan to do more advanced versions of the phone in the future," Dagar added.
He gave up his job to concentrate on his technology, formed a team of six people and started his venture, Kriyate Design Solutions. Currently, the venture is being funded by Rolex Awards under its Young Laureates Program, in which they select five people from across the world every two years and fund their projects.
The smartphone uses Shape Memory Alloy technology, based on the concept that metals remember their original shapes, i.e. expand and contract to its original shape after use.
The phone’s ‘screen’ has a grid of pins, which move up and down as per requirement. The grid has a Braille display, where pins come up to represent a character or letter.
This screen will be capable of elevating and depressing the contents to form patterns in Braille.
All other elements are like any other smartphone.
While current voice recognition operations like Siri offer considerable assistance for visually and otherwise impaired users, this new smartphone goes above and beyond. Users will be able to not only send and receive text messages with a changing Braille keypad, but also check everyday tools like maps.
Most remarkably, the phone will be designed to scan other objects, including text and photos, and then convert those scans into readable Braille or other recognizable shapes.
Currently being tested at the LV Prasad Eye Institute, the phone is expected to be released by the end of 2013. The phone is expected to cost roughly $185. (QNA)
