COMPANIES TO WATCH: The thumb revolution

At little nugget of innovation was found at the AT&T Foundry in Palo Alto, Calif. The telecom giant is trying to change its stripes to be a high tech innovator. One of the more popular technologies at the Foundry came from RingBow Ltd., a start-up from Israel that bases is product called “The Ring” on human-computer interaction.

Ringbow is a finger-worn Bluetooth device that adds gestural recognition that enables users to manipulate on-screen content without touching the screen. AT&T’s executive director of marketing Mark Nagel called the RingBow prototype the future of touch technology.

RingBow co-founder and CEO Efrat Barit said this product is suited for tablets and large format display units for gaming and in-app navigation. RingBow also enhances multi-touch scenarios such as collaborating on a drawing and by adding hand gestures users will have more control.

For example, if the tablet device is connected to your TV you can change from the Shopping Network to the NFL Network by pressing your thumb against the diamondshape single button on the Ring which will send a signal to your set top box.

In an interview, Barit told CDN that RingBow is not only interested in fun applications such as games or TV but for any purpose. “RingBow will be adopted for everything touch screen related and not just for fun applications,” she said.

Barit added that the Ring device communicates with touch screens and is meant to compliment the user experience.

“It will enhance the user activity with touch screens and will make them more efficient and professional,” she said.

RingBow attempts to do two things: control the operation system remotely and free up your hands. “The RingBow device becomes more relevant because nowadays people are using their tablets for watching TV and movies and they do not want to touch the screen all the time to operate it,” Berit said.

The example, Barit gave CDN was with a finger drawing application. Without a Ring device the user if they wanted to change colours would have to stop drawing, tap on the menu area, select a category, choose the new colour and then go back to the drawing. With the Ring the user can change the colour simultaneously while drawing, while also changing the thickness of the line.

Barit hopes the market is ready for RingBow in 2012. Currently she said that game developers are producing games specifically for the Ring device. RingBow is trying to eliminating the need to display menus and toolbars.

RingBow can be used for smartphones, touch screen all-in-one PCs, tablets, smart home applications such as the Internet Refrigerator, in-car computing and consoles.

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Follow Paolo Del Nibletto on Twitter: @PaoloCDN.

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Jim Love, Chief Content Officer, IT World Canada

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Paolo Del Nibletto
Paolo Del Nibletto
Former editor of Computer Dealer News, covering Canada's IT channel community.

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