This smartphone of the future has no touchscreen

We’ve come a long way from the computer being a new and novel device, to people around the world holding more computing power in their pocket than was used to put a man on the moon. So it’s not hard to imagine the sort of future we can expect from the tech industry.

The latest futuristic design to make its appearance is a concept smartphone that forgoes a touchscreen altogether, replacing it with holograms instead. Called Alo, the concept is the brainchild of French designer Jamie Olivet, in collaboration with acclaimed designer Phillipe Starck.smartphone that forgoes a touchscreen altogether, replacing it with holograms instead. Called Alo, the concept is the brainchild of French designer Jamie Olivet, in collaboration with acclaimed designer Phillipe Starck.

Instead of housing a keypad or touchscreen, a user would interact with the smartphone using a holographic projector and voice-activation. The projector would display a holographic screen above the device, letting the user read their messages or even watch videos, according to Oliviet.

In addition, while the device core protecting the internals would be made of a moulded aluminium alloy, the outer shell is instead designed as a “gelatinous, supple and natural envelope that perfectly fits your hand.” The external shell would also be capable of providing haptic and thermal feedback as a counterpart to current day notification alerts.

Though designed for comfort, the images seem to indicate that the outer body would be slippery to hold, likely resulting in you dropping the phone a lot. However, Oliviet has thought of that too, promising the Alo’s surface would be ideally crafted from an unnamed material that “repairs automatically as soon as it is damaged.”

As cool as all of this sounds, it’s important to remember Alo is only a concept right now, though the designers, who work for French electronics company Thomson, do intend to build a prototype in the future. Unfortunately, there is as yet only fringe research into self-repairing materials of the kind Oliviet talks about, so that feature is likely still distant. On the the other hand, consumer holographic devices are a very real possibility in the near future, given that many tech companies, Microsoft included, are already building and testing their own prototype devices. So, perhaps we may see a screen-less smartphone like Alo not too far in the future.

Image caption: Alo’s concept details a body made of a yet-unknown material that self-repairs damage.
Image courtesy: Jerome Oliviet