One of the most interesting trends among smartphone innovations today is the idea of a modular phone. Concepts like Phonebloks and Project Ara have been floating around for a few years now, but recently the first actual consumer modular phones, the Moto Z, and LG G5 were unveiled. Some may argue that these are not truly modular in the same sense as the concepts because they are not actually built upon interchangeable parts, but rather have interchangeable add-ons. Still, the ability for the user to swap out modules to suit their needs is a big step in flexibility.
Now, you don’t have to buy a modular phone to take advantage of these capabilities. If you own a Samsung Galaxy S7, you can simply buy the i-BLADES smart case. The idea behind the case is to take something that most users will want to purchase anyway (a case to protect their expensive smartphone) and use that to add a variety of new features and capabilities to the device. The case itself connects to your device through the USB port, and modules called Smartblades can be added on as needed. And they can be stacked up to ten times. Of course, the more modules you use, the more bulk it will add to your device, so you’ll probably want to pick a few useful modules to keep it from becoming too heavy, but this could certainly come in handy if you will be away from a charger for a while and need to be sure your phone has power. The i-BLADES case comes with a Turbo 64 Smartblade, which includes a secondary battery for increased battery life, 64 GB of additional storage, and a secondary microSD slot. Another interesting Smartblade is the SmartVR blade, which is a collapsable virtual reality headset that attaches to the i-Blades case. Those who pre-order the Galaxy S7 Smartcase with Smartblade for $99 will also be able to get the SmartVR blade for an additional $20 by using the promotional code “Smartvrgalaxys7” at checkout.
At this point the available Smartblade options are still quite limited, but it will be interesting to see where this goes and what options will be available in the future as consumer needs continue to develop. Check out the Youtube video below for more information.
