Amazon has launched its first self-designed smartphone, the Amazon Fire, incorporating its whole digital database and technologies to create an immersive user experience.
HumanIPO reported earlier this month Amazon sent out invites to a product launch to be held on June 18, but gave no indication of what sort of device was to be expected – although reports suggested a 3D smartphone may be on the cards.
Amazon yesterday launched the 4.7-inch HD screen smartphone named Fire, which features two cutting edge technologies: the “Dynamic Perspective” sensor system which creates an interactive user experience – dubbed the “3D” element in many reports – and the “Firefly” instant recognition function which connects users to the Amazon online database.
“Fire Phone puts everything you love about Amazon in the palm of your hand – instant access to Amazon’s vast content ecosystem and exclusive features like the Mayday button, ASAP, Second Screen, X-Ray, free unlimited photo storage, and more,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com founder and chief executive officer (CEO).
“The Firefly button lets you identify printed web and email addresses, phone numbers, QR and bar codes, artwork, and over 100 million items, including songs, movies, TV shows, and products—and take action in seconds.
“We invented a new sensor system called Dynamic Perspective that recognises where a user’s head is relative to the device—we use it to offer customers a more immersive experience, one-handed navigation, and gestures that actually work.”
The Dynamic Perspective technology includes four ultra-low power cameras and four infrared LEDs positioned in the front face of Fire, as well as a cutting edge dedicated custom processor, real-time computer vision algorithms, and graphics rendering engine to enable the device to interact with the user and user’s position.
The interactive element sees the device auto-scroll through pages of a book or website as necessary without the user touching the screen, Amazon Music will display song lyrics through tilting the phone, while the “peek” function layers information such as ratings and reviews over locations in the Maps app, or allows a buyer to view details of a product they are viewing in the Shopping app.
Firefly’s instant recognition function can identify text on signs, posters, magazines and business cards in order to make a call, send an email, save as a contact, or go to the website straight from the recognition function.
The device also recognises over 245,000 movies and TV episodes, 160 live TV channels, 35 million songs and 70 million products, and can provide further information and purchasing details about content it recognises.
Amazon also announced it will make both the Dynamic Perspective and Firefly platforms available for innovation by external developers.
“And this is only the beginning – the most powerful inventions are the ones that empower others to unleash their creativity – that’s why today we are launching the Dynamic Perspective SDK and the Firefly SDK – we can’t wait to see how developers surprise us,” Bezos said.
Fire boasts a range of other features, such as “Mayday”, where users hit a quick access Mayday button and an expert pops up via live video to guide the user through their difficulty, Advanced Streaming and Prediction (ASAP), which predicts which movies and TV episodes will interest the user and prepares them automatically for instant playback, and free unlimited cloud storage of all photos taken on the Fire.
The device will initially only be available in the United States exclusively on provider AT&T, as of July 25.
