Foldable smartphones are now going commercial this year. Samsung and Huawei have already launched their first foldable smartphones — Galaxy Fold and Mate X. LG was expected to announce its foldable smartphone at MWC 2019 but that didn’t materialize.
Now, a new patent from LG has surfaced online, which not only confirms that LG is indeed working on a foldable smartphone, it also reveals how the phone will look. As for the naming, the company has already registered several names — LG Flex, Foldi, Duplex, and Bendi but none of them have been confirmed yet.
The patent shows an LG foldable smartphone with a clamshell design. It addresses the bending of the flexible display and the flexible plate and the company has carried out various tests, showing that both the screen and the plate do not show wave patterns or optical distortions when the display is bent.
The display is on the inside and the screen has a bending radius of 2.5R. The smaller the bending radius, the flatter the device can be folded. The company is now working to develop its flexible display to achieve a bending radius of 1R, where the display can fold in half like a piece of paper.
However, LG is not the only smartphone manufacturer that is working on a foldable smartphone with a clamshell design. Motorola is planning to launch its foldable smartphone with a similar design named Motorola RAZR (2019). Samsung is also rumored to launch another foldable smartphone with a similar design, along with Lenovo and ZTE.
