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The world's first smartphone for blind people is here. Soon,
they will be able to read SMSes and emails on this phone, which converts all
text into Braille patterns.
"We have created the world's first Braille
smartphone," says its innovator, Sumit Dagar, whose company is being
incubated at the Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship, located
in IIM Ahmedabad campus. "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 says.
Dagar, who is a post-graduate from the National Institute of
Design (NID), says he was motivated to develop the device when he realised that
so far, technology was only serving the mainstream and ignoring the
marginalised. 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 adds.
Dagar started the project three years ago while studying
interaction designing at NID. After working with a couple of companies, 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 Programme, in which they
select five people from across the world every two years and fund their
projects.
How it works
· 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.
Posted By: rihan khan
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