24/06/2009 by David Slade.

San Francisco based MOTO Development Group has helped design some interesting gadgets including the LiveScribe Smart Pen and Flip camera.  Now the company’s labs are showing a demo of a large multi-touch screen that can potentially scale up to 50-inches.The prototype display from MOTO Labs has the thickness of an LCD display. It does not use cameras or bulky projection technology,  explain the Labs in this video.

“When this technology is available at the right price it will shift the paradigm for computer use away from individual interaction towards multiple users working on multi-touch surfaces together,” says Daniell Hebert, MOTO Development Group CEO in statement. “It will be all over the workplace.”

Though MOTO Labs claims its touchscreen tech is such that “no other system currently delivers” that may be a bit of a stretch. Israeli company N-Trig says it can make multi-touch displays in almost any size that users want. N-Trig has also launched a touchscreen digitizer kit to make it easy for software developers to create multi-touch based applications.

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24/06/2009 by David Slade.

Two-finger touch or multi-touch? Users don’t have to choose. It can be touch anywhere says French start-up Sensitive Object, which offers a touchscreen technology that goes beyond the traditional display area.

The company’s ‘Anywhere MultiTouch’ platform is based on the recognition of sound waves propagated in an object when the user touches it.

A user’s touch on a glass surface produces a pattern of sound waves that creates an acoustic signature unique to the location of the touch, says Sensitive Object. The company, which was created in 2003, says it has found a way to associate this acoustic signature to the user’s every action.  A glass panel equipped with two piezoelectric sensors, similar to what is used in some new flat speakers technology, is used to detect the sound waves and determine their acoustic signature.

The Anywhere MultiTouch platform can be used on various materials such as glass, aluminium and plastics says Sensitive Object.

The company hasn’t disclosed how much its new technology will cost. For now it says this will be available at a “very competitive price.” The platform is Windows 7 compliant and offers handwriting recognition.

Sensitive Object hopes to bring its technology to cellphones, netbooks, laptops, PCs and portable games terminals. For app developers, the technology can be handy to expand how users interact with their devices, it says. For instance in case of a cellphone, a game app can require touch on any part of the phone instead of just the screen.

“Sensitive Object’s products are now used in various markets such as home automation, interactive point of sale or information desks and gaming,” says Bruno Thuillier, CTO of Sensitive Object in a statement. “We’re now addressing the handheld and consumer markets.”

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