Fujitsu Ring Does Text Input As Well

[CEATEC 2015] Smart rings are the kind of wearable technology that have not quite made it to the consciousness of everyone at the office, or in industrial situations, as it does feel as though there is a whole lot more work that needs to be done still between now and the future before they become as ubiquitous as say, the smartphone. Having said that, this has not stopped the likes of 16Lab from churning out the waterproof Computing Ring last year, but Fujitsu wants to have a say as well with their ring-type wearable device that allows one to spell out letters in mid-air, only to have them magically appear on a screen. Perfect for those rural areas where a teacher lacks a blackboard and some chalk, but has a tablet and a portable solar power charger.

We did mention this ring-type wearable device at the start of the year, and it seems that we now have the chance to try it out on the showfloor. The design looks far from refined – as it was shown off in shades of white, fire engine red and grey, and all of them look rather flimsy with a sheer plastic feel to it, which is far removed from the premium lookin Computing Ring from 16Lab. Still, I suppose the exterior can be worked on later, as what matters more would be the interior.

This device will come with an integrated NFC tag reader, allowing you to have the ring-type wearable device interact with a head mounted display (HMD) through a simple single-handed operation. In other words, you can boot up the camera application simply by touching the NFC tag, snapping photos on the spot while entering handwritten notes – literally, on the screen with but a finger. It was pretty smooth in real life, although there was a bit of a lag between the movement of the finger and it appearing on the display, somewhere in the region of half a second thereabouts.

Edwin Kee
Categories: Gadgets
Tags: CEATEC, ceatec 2015, Fujitsu, Wearable Tech