Dubai: Lenovo is trying to bring innovation into the smartphone arena — an area in which it has been lacking for quite some time — by becoming the first to launch a smartphone — Phab 2 Pro — with augmented reality.
Anjana Srinivasan, chief of staff and tablet marketing director at Lenovo, told Gulf News that the technology uses computer vision to enable devices to see the world around you without relying on GPS. It allows developers to create experiences that incorporate things like indoor navigation, 3D mapping, and augmented reality (AR) with a set of sensors and cameras and a computer-vision software.
“The market for AR and VR is projected to grow significantly in the next few years. We choose this technology and there is no denying that [Google’s] Tango is one of the most intriguing pieces of new technology to be released in recent years,” she said.
The 6.4-inch device has a Quad HD display (2560 x 1440 resolution) with 4GB of RAM and 32GB of storage capacity. It supports 128GB via microSD slot. It is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 652 processor, specifically designed for Tango. It is priced at Dh1,999 and will be available in mid-December.
She said that this is the first phone to have four cameras — three at the back and one in the front. The rear has a normal 16MP camera, coupled with a depth sensor and a motion tracking sensor.
“The magic of tango happens at the back. When this phone looks at the world through these cameras, it captures 250,000 measurements per second and the need for accurate timestamping is so critical it requires updates at least every 50 microseconds a piece,” she said.
With a Tango phone, it senses and maps its surroundings, supports motion tracking, depth perception and area learning features.
Some Tango apps are available now on the Google Play store.
With motion tracking, she said the phone sees its own location in 3D. Area learning tells the smartphone its location. Depth perception lets the device analyse the shape of the world around it by detecting surfaces and obstacles.
Amazon, Hot Wheels, Lowe’s American Museum and Natural History, Schell Games, Autodesk, Accenture, Wayfair, Glympse, Fiat, Legacy Games are developing apps for Tango platform.
Ziad Matar, senior director for business development at Qualcomm Middle East, said that the chip allow users to navigate stores, museums and other indoor locations, with directions overlaid onto your surroundings.
“Snapdragon processors distribute this processing across the Qualcomm Hexagon digital signal processor, CPU and Qualcomm Adreno GPU,” he said.
