LG exited the smartphone market back in 2021, but it looks like they might make a comeback soon.
According to a patent that was published earlier this week, and noticed by Windows Report, it appears that LG is still working on a rollable smartphone. A rollable smartphone from LG first saw the light of day back in 2022 after the company exited the smartphone market. Sort of a, what could have been.
Companies file for patents all the time. They get filed for things they are working on, but not necessarily things that will see the light of day. Of note, this patent was filed by LG Display, which means that they could be working on rollable displays to supply to other companies, like Huawei, HONOR, OPPO, or even Motorola. So don’t take this as an absolute return to the smartphone market for LG.
According to this patent, the screen would roll out, sort of like a conveyor belt or a moving walkway. The patent also says that the device could roll out to different sizes, going from a compact phone to a larger device like a tablet.
This isn’t the first rollable
As mentioned already, we did see a leaked LG rollable smartphone surface back in 2021, which was really unique. However, these days, we’ve seen a few other rollable devices show up – none of have gone on sale yet, however.
Back at MWC Barcelona in February, Tecno showcased a rollable smartphone called the Phantom Ultimate, and it was actually available for journalists to check out – instead of being behind glass. Motorola also showed off a rollable phone last year, which was a bit different from these others. Where instead of rolling out from left to right, it was up and down. Samsung is also rumored to actually launch a rollable phone in 2025, which means that we could actually see it go on sale. Of course, it won’t be cheap.
Now that foldables have pretty much matured, many smartphone makers are going to be looking at innovating with rollable phones. LG actually already has something like this, with the OLED TV R. Which is a rollable OLED TV. They’ve been showing this off at CES for the past few years, with it getting better and better every year.
It is important to remember that many patents don’t result in real products that go on sale; it’s more part of what the R&D team does and can also be sold to other companies or at least licensed. Which I think is more likely than LG making a return to the smartphone market.
