The first
mobile phone that lets users design their own haptic effects to
personalize touch feedback, the Samsung Haptic 2 uses Immersion technology.
Touch feedback makes the mobile phone user experience more sensory, intuitive, useful, and fun. With it touchy feedback
- Exhilarating force feedback in mobile games, similar to that found in console games
- Unmistakable confirmation in response to touchscreen, keypad, and button presses
- Unique caller IDs with distinct vibrations that reveal who is calling even when sound is turned off
From
its "My own haptic" menu, Haptic 2 lets users create personalized
haptic effects through a graphical user interface based on the
conventions of Immersion's VibeTonz Studio authoring tool for
developers. Users touch and drag icons representing wave shape,
duration, and intensity to create distinctive vibrational patterns.
These creations let users personalize their phone with unique haptic
experiences, such as assigning them as non-audible ringtones that
signal incoming calls.
"Samsung fully understands the role of
haptics as a key differentiator and its potential for transforming the
mobile user experience -- and they're capitalizing on it," said Craig
Vachon, Immersion's vice president and general manager, Mobility. "The
runaway success of Samsung's Haptic phones shows the market's desire
for richer connections and new ways to interact with people, devices,
and information. These phones are cutting edge examples of a new wave
of touch feedback innovations in consumer electronics. A user-definable
haptic feedback system is a step toward a completely new type of
user-generated content."
Starting in March 2008, Samsung used Korean
TV, Web, and print ads to emphasize the first Haptic phone's unique
touch features, content, responsiveness, and fun. The phone was such a
huge success that Samsung launched a second phone in late September
with even more haptic features. Samsung announced Haptic 2, priced at
approximately $600 for the 4 GB version and $690 for the 16 GB version,
surpassed sales of 75,000 units in South Korea in its first three
weeks.(1)