Samsung may be planning to equip some of its upcoming smartphones with a motion sensor. The company recently applied for a trademark for the name ISOCELL Motion at the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO). The trademark application was first spotted by Dutch tech blog LetsGoDigital.
Categorized as Class 9, Samsung describes its ISOCELL Motion thing as a “Dynamic vision sensor (DVS) for object and motion detection; motion detection sensors; object detection sensors; camera image sensors for smartphones and tablets.”
Samsung already produces camera sensors for smartphones under the brand name ISOCELL. The company’s ISOCELL Bright HMX is the industry’s first 108-megapixel smartphone camera sensor. It debuted with the super-expensive Xiaomi Mi Mix Alpha in September. Several other Xioami smartphones are also getting this 108-megapixel sensor.
As for Samsung’s own smartphones, the Galaxy S11, and some of the 2020 Galaxy A phones are likely to get it initially. The ISOCELL Motion sensor, meanwhile, should be limited to flagship phones only and may end up in next year’s Galaxy S flagship first.
Galaxy S11 is the likely candidate for Samsung’s ISOCELL Motion sensor
The concept of a motion sensor in a smartphone is not new. LG pulled it off with its G8 ThinQ phone earlier this year. Most recently, Google equipped its Pixel 4 smartphones with a radar chip for motion detection. The newly launched Google phone is capable of capturing and analyzing your hand motions to let you do things like changing the volume, wake up the screen, and much more. And while this adds to the device’s functionalities, a motion sensor on a smartphone is yet to become a game-changer.
However, Samsung still appears to be preparing to join the brigade and make this motion detection thing a trend. By the looks of it, the Galaxy S11 will debut Samsung’s ISOCELL Motion sensor next year. What functionalities it’ll bring remains to be seen. Among other things, as LetsGoDigital points out, Samsung could use this technology to reduce motion blur on images as well.
The Galaxy S11 should arrive in February 2020, possibly a few days ahead of MWC 2020, which starts in February 2020 in Barcelona. The upcoming Galaxy flagship is rumored to be powered by the Exynos 9830 or the Snapdragon 865 chip, depending upon the market. Advanced facial scanning and a camera setup that has never been seen before are some other rumors about this phone. How many of these turn out to be true remains to be seen.