Samsung wins patent for dual-screen smartphone, can now fight it out with Microsoft

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samsung dual-screen smartphone patents

After a long journey through the patent approvals process, Samsung has been granted a patent for “Portable device comprising a touch-screen display, and method for controlling same” which describes numerous dual-screen smartphone patents such as how to control such devices.

Patent 10459625 notes the methods to:

A controlling a portable device comprising a first touch screen and a second touch screen is provided. The method includes displaying first information related to a first application on the first touch screen and displaying second information related to the first application on the second touch screen; receiving a first user input moving to the first touch screen on the second touch screen; and replacing the first information and the second information with a third information and a fourth information related to the first application on the first touch screen and the second touch screen, in response to receiving the first user input, wherein each of the third information and the fourth information is displayed while being slidden in direction from the second touch screen to the first touch screen and the third information is displayed over a boundary between the first touch screen and the second screen during the sliding of the third information and the fourth information.

The patent dates back all the way to 2013, with some parts stretching to 2011, and may mean trouble for Microsoft’s own dual-screen patent, simply “Display Device“, though Microsoft’s patent appears somewhat more generic and covers both folding tablets and folding phones and only dates to 2017.

Microsoft’s patent 10451911 notes:

A display device comprises a first chassis and a first backlight housing attached to the first chassis and comprising a first wall. A first optical film layer between a first light guide plate and a first rear polarizer comprises a secured end bonded to the first wall. A second chassis is rotatably coupled to the first chassis and includes a second backlight housing attached to the second chassis and comprising a second wall. A second optical film layer between a second light guide plate and a second rear polarizer includes a secured end bonded to the second wall.

Of course in another age, this may have been a problem, but with Satya Nadella’s arrival, Microsoft settled most of their patent battles with the company.

Hopefully, we will see some of the good and innovative ideas, such as clipboard management and app switching, we will see more dual-screen smartphone patents also show up in actual devices in the future.

Via Patentlymobile

More about the topics: dual-screen smartphone, microsoft, patents, samsung