* New iPhone expected to include Force Touch tech
* Not new technology, but Apple taking it forward
* Pressure-sensitive screens mimic feel of real buttons
By Jeremy Wagstaff and Michael Gold
SINGAPORE/TAIPEI, Sept 9 (Reuters) - By adding a more
realistic sense of touch to its iPhone, Apple Inc AAPL.O may
have conquered a technology that has long promised to take us
beyond merely feeling the cold glass of our
mobile device screens.
In its latest iPhones, Apple is expected to include what it
calls Force Touch, allowing users to interact more intuitively
with their devices via a pressure-sensitive screen which mimics
the feel and response of real buttons.
In the long run, the technology also promises new or better
applications, from more lifelike games and virtual reality to
adding temperature, texture and sound to our screens.
"Force Touch is going to push the envelope of how we
interact with our screens," says Joel Evans, vice president of
mobile enablement at Mobiquity, a mobile consultancy.
Apple hasn't disclosed what it will announce at an event on
Wednesday, but reports have said it will unveil new iPhones
incorporating a version of the Force Touch technology already in
some laptop touchpads and its Watches. Apple declined to
comment.
As with previous forays, from touch screens to fingerprint
sensors, Apple isn't the first with this technology, but by
combining some existing innovations with its own, it could
leverage its advantage of control over hardware, interface and
the developers who could wrap Force Touch into its apps.
"Here we go again. Apple's done it with gyroscopes,
accelerometers, they did it with pressure sensors, they've done
it with compass, they've been great at expediting the adoption
of these sensors," said Ali Foughi, CEO of US-based NextInput,
which has its own technology, trademarked ForceTouch. "Apple is
at the forefront."
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TOUCHY FEELY
Haptic technology - a tactile response to touching an
interface - isn't new, even in mobile devices. Phones have long
vibrated to alert users of incoming calls in silent mode, or
when they touch an onscreen button.
But efforts to go beyond that have been limited.
BlackBerry BB.TO incorporated pressure sensing into its
Storm phone in 2008. And Rob Lacroix, vice president of
engineering at Immersion Corp IMMR.O , said his company worked
in 2012 with Fujitsu 6702.T on the Raku-Raku Smartphone, an
Android phone that could distinguish between a soft and firm
touch to help users unfamiliar with handheld devices.
But most efforts have been hamstrung by either a poor
understanding of the user's needs, or technical limitations. A
vibrating buzz, for instance, has negative connotations, causing
most people to turn off any vibration feature, says James Lewis,
CEO of UK-based Redux, which has been working on similar touch
technology for several years.
The technology powering vibrations is also primitive, he
said, meaning there's a slight delay and a drain on the battery.
Early versions of pressure-sensing technology also required a
slight gap between screen and enclosure, leaving it vulnerable
to the elements.
Apple seems to have solved such problems, experts said,
judging from their trackpads and the Watch. Indeed, the trackpad
carries the same sensation of a physical click of its
predecessors, but without the actual pad moving at all.
The result: In the short term, Force Touch may simply make
interacting with a screen more like something we'd touch in real
life - a light switch, say, or a physical keyboard. With Force
Touch, the device should be able to tell not only whether we are
pressing the screen, but how firmly. It should in turn respond
with a sensation - not just a vibration, but with a click - even
if that click is itself a trick of technology.
"What we're going to see initially is putting life back into
dead display," said Redux's Lewis. "We just got used to the cold
feel of glass."
HARD PRESSED
To be sure, mobile is not the first industry to flirt with
haptics.
For example, for car drivers, Redux demonstrates a
tablet-like display which creates the illusions of bumps and
friction when you run your fingers over the glass,
mimicking physical buttons and sliders so your eyes don't need
to leave the road.
Mobiquity's technical adviser Robert McCarthy points to
several potential uses of Apple's technology - measuring the
force of touch when entering a password, say, to indicate how
confident the user is of their selection, or keying in a numeric
passcode using different pressure levels as an extra layer of
security.
While Apple's adoption of the technology has awoken the
mobile industry to its possibilities, it was pipped to the post
by Chinese handset maker Huawei HWT.UL , which this
month unveiled one model with what it also tagged Force Touch
technology. Pressing harder in a photo app, for example,
allows you to zoom in on a picture without the usual two-finger
spread.
Other manufacturers are exploring how to make touching a
device more friendly, and more advanced, says Freddie Liu, CFO
of Taiwan-based TPK Holding Co Ltd 3673.TW , an Apple supplier.
"This is just the beginning for Force Touch," he said.