Feb 29, 2016 | By Tess
Whether you are partial to iPhones, or prefer Samsungs, HTC’s, or LG’s, it is hard to escape one common factor between them: the smartphones on the market are practically all rectangular these days. To counter this reality and to offer consumers a new aesthetic and ergonomic option for their smartphones, Christina Cyr and Linda Inagawa have started Dtoor, or “Designing the opposite of rectangle,” a company dedicated to creating non-rectangular and functional smartphones, and they are using technologies like 3D printing in the process.
Dtoor’s first model, the Cyrcle, is currently in development and as you may have guessed by its name, is a circular shaped smartphone. As stated on the company’s website, “Our generation has been brainwashed into thinking that the rectangular shape is attractive simply because it is easy to manufacture. Nature itself is filled with very few rectangles. Why aren’t we striving to make a more natural and sensual form?”
The Cyrcle, which is being presented in its prototype stages at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week, is currently made from a 3D printed flip-open casing, almost resembling a compact mirror or makeup case, and tech made from a Seeed RePhone Kit. The smartphone also possesses open-source components, which means that it can be updated and tweaked to fit your own needs.
The modular and partially 3D printed smartphone was not only designed by women developers, but is also being created for women, and not just as an easy marketing ploy of making it pink. That is, the small circular phone has been designed to fit into smaller pockets (or clipped and dangled id you don’t have pockets) to accommodate women’s fashions, and has been ergonomically designed to be held more comfortably between the head and shoulder. Not only that, however, the Cyrcle is being developed to be less distracting to its users by only including notifications for personal messages and notifications from a select group of people, your family for instance.
Though currently not on the market, expect to see a Kickstarter campaign launched for the Cyrcle’s first generation 2G model this August, where the round-breaking smartphone will be available for $100. Dtoor is also reportedly working on releasing a 4G model of the Cyrcle in August of 2017 and is hoping to one day develop a model with dual edge-to-edge screens and Android software.
Founder and CEO of Dtoor, Christina Cyr, met fellow developer Linda Inagawa while they both worked at Microsoft in the 1990s, and she subsequently worked as a biochemist in Tokyo, Japan and as lead software engineer for the NEC Corporation before founding Dtoor. Inspired by a want for a smartphone that was suited to her own needs, Cyr is certainly succeeding in breaking down some rectangular barriers, and we are sure to keep up with the progress of her Cyrcle 3D printed phone in the near future.
Posted in 3D Printing Application
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Maybe smartphones are rectangular because it's the only practical shape that fits in pockets, offers decent width-to-height ratio, is compatible with the rest of electronic displays (TVs, Monitors), and optimizes internal space. Not to mention how much of a nightmare non-rectangular LCD screens are to program or design....
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