Lenovo unveils rollable laptop and Motorola Rizr phone

Lenovo – and its smartphone subsidiary Motorola – are ready to roll.

Alongside a series of concrete product launches at this year’s MWC show in Barcelona, ​​the company unveiled a pair of concept devices with a similar theme: a rollable Motorola phone and a rollable Lenovo laptop.

Neither has a name, and neither is for sale, but they’re a proof of concept for a technology that’s been bending the bounds of consumer tech for a few years now, and looks ready to go. follow the foldables from here too long.

We’ve seen them both before, but only briefly. They were featured in a short promotional clip for the Lenovo Tech World event late last year, but this is the first time the press has gotten to see either of them in person.

Let’s start with the phone. What at first glance appears to be a fairly chunky smartphone with a 5-inch screen in a squat 15:9 aspect ratio can actually roll up to reveal a full 6.5-inch display in a 22:9 plus form factor. traditional.

When fully extended, the extra screen dangles slightly alarmingly over the top of the device – as someone who’s scuffed their fair share of foldables, this is a phone I Really wouldn’t want to fall off – revealing its unofficial name on the rear: the Rizr, both a play on the foldable Razr and a nod to the company’s T3 line of slider phones from the 2000s.

Meanwhile, when the phone is “closed”, the spare screen wraps around the back, giving you an extra mini display. Motorola showed it off by running an always-on display, camera viewfinder, and fun animations and widgets, much like last year’s Razr phone cover screen.

What’s probably most impressive about the “Rizr” is how seamlessly it seems to work. You can manually roll and scroll the screen with the press of a button, but it’s also smart enough to figure things out on its own.

Try watching a video in landscape mode and it will automatically expand to give you the full screen view. Or open an email in portrait mode, and as the keyboard pops up, the rest of the panel will give you a bit more space to compose your thoughts.

it will also roll down a fraction whenever you need to access the selfie camera or the earpiece for phone calls, as both are hidden out of sight just behind the top of the panel.

Similar technology is found in the company’s prototype roll-up laptop. Presented in a ThinkBook chassis — though again, it’s not yet a physical product — the laptop’s 12.7-inch screen can stretch upwards to a full panel of 15.3 inches.

When fully extended, the laptop looks a little unsightly, but you can see the appeal to programmers and others who use dual screens with portrait-mode monitors.

When not extended, the flexible OLED panel slides under the keyboard, and right now it’s so early that the pixels don’t even turn off when it does – although that’s the one of the changes the company would introduce for any future retail model. Likewise, at the moment it’s not a touchscreen, but it’s an obvious addition for a possible product.

It should also be able to survive 20-30,000 roll cycles to meet Lenovo’s standards, although the company’s representative didn’t elaborate on the durability of the current iteration.

Lenovo didn’t let us get our hands on either of its rollable designs, and was careful to insist – repeatedly – that they’re not products, and never will be. , at least not in this exact form. Company representatives would also not be solicited When commercial versions may appear.

We’ve seen many other rollable concepts over the years, from LG Rollable and Oppo X 2021 smartphones to Samsung’s Flex Hybrid, a concept tablet that both folds And rollers, presented at CES last month. Hopefully, before too long, someone will let us buy one.