Polymer Vision: rollable e-paper is finally on the roll

[dugbug]

Perhaps (given that form factor) they can integrate a cell phone in the "closed" mode that opens up to an eink reader? Throw in an MP3 player and then all the devices I carry drop to one.

-d

[Thomas]

Originally Posted by CommanderROR

I'll send them a mail asking for a little more information...let's see whether they respond and what they are willing to share. So far we have little to go by apart from the flexible screen 5" screen and the fact that it contains a 3G network card.

Dear mobilereaders, my name is Thomas and I am working for Polymer Vision, the creators of the Readius. Polymer Vision was contacted by one of the editors of the site and here I am to respond to your questions. Obviously my comments will be coloured by my background, you will have to forgive me for that (call it professional de-formation or extreme enthousiasm about the Readius!) Some comments for now:
- The Readius samples shown last February in Barcelona were handmade engineering samples to show the concept.
- The current samples we have are samples of the commercial product we will launch in 2008. They are not fully functional yet.
- Samples will be shown in public and demonstrated during the Barcelona Mobile World Congress in febr. The final specifications of the Readius will then be communicated as well.
- Telecom Italia Mobile is our lead customer and will sell the Readius in Italy. We are in discussion with other customers about launching the Readius in other countries.
- The Readius is a pocket size e-reader ideal for personalised information with the possibility of updating your favourite information anytime, anywhere via its 3G connection.
- The user (via a pc application) will be able to download content to the device and configure the types of favourite info he/she would like to be updated about when on the move (eg. RSS feeds).
- With the introduction of the first rollable display at the size of 5" we already make a big step compared to current mobile display sizes (2-3.5"). But there is more to come. Among others wee are working on higher resolution and larger display sizes . For truly mobile usage (pocketsize device) we think 8-9" is the sweet spot to be working on.
Let me know if you want to know more.

[igorsk]

What ebook formats are you going to support?

[GregS]

Thomas 8-9 inch may well be a sweet spot, especially for fiction readers.

Obviously this is a new process and manufacturing problems have to be encountered cautiously and improved upon step by step.

But is it technically possible in the near future to see much bigger screens, rolled up like a scroll perhaps, or gently folded into a thick book form?

A4 has so many applications very different to the needs of fiction reading. Is there an inherent technical problem, or is it a matter of marketing and manufacture?

[CommanderROR]

@Thomas

Thank you for joining us. I just put up a frontpage post so that we have a central place for people to post their question and for you to find them and (if possible) answer them.

Find it here:

[mrkai]

Thomas,

Is this thing going to be/slated to be a USB Mass Storage Device?

As a user of Not Windows, the notion of "Desktop PC Software" makes me sad

If this "Desktop PC Software" is slated in fact to be required for full functionality usability, I know a...guy... that does Mac OS X development that you guys might talk to...

[jayakumar]

Thanks Thomas and MobileRead. This is an extremely interesting product to us all. Could you share with us a bit more information about the hardware of the device. Specifically, which processor, display controller and other hardware details as well as which operating system you selected. I hope you picked Linux. I am biased because I wrote the E-Ink metronomefb driver. :-)