ACADEMY AWARDS SAMSUNG AD Shows GALAXY Z FLIP Phone Up Close

While it may come across as strange that some tech-related news could come out of the recently-held 92^nd Academy Awards, this one might actually count. Last week, speculation has abounded on an upcoming “Unpacked” event by South Korean smartphone manufacturing giant Samsung, to showcase their upcoming devices both soon-to-release and in-development. The latter might be the possible status for a particular Samsung smartphone, foldable like the already-released Galaxy Fold phone-tablet but in a different way: like an old flip-top mobile phone. What does this have to do with the Oscars? The new Samsung phone was teased during the commercial break.

CNet tells us that one of the ads that aired during the telecast of the 92^nd Oscars on ABC was a teaser by Samsung of their next “Unpacked” event to be held in New York, this coming Tuesday to be exact. While ostensibly the star of the hour when it comes is to be the next mainline Samsung Galaxy smartphone the S20 (and variants), for the short commercial that lasted less than 30 seconds it was the folding Galaxy Z Flip that got all attention. While images were reportedly leaked of the phone already, this was the first time it was focused on in action.

The purported reason that Samsung revived the flip-phone concept for the Z Flip smartphone (a la Motorola’s new-generation Razr) was that the 90-degree fold setup was going to be an optimal mode for video chat, similar perhaps to a “Star Trek” communicator but with video display. The Korean company also pre-emptively answered questions about the foldable touchscreen by saying on the onscreen fine-print that the display crease is naturally occurring. It also showed a smaller touchscreen bar on the phone’s “lid,” along with its possible functions. It serves as caller ID and also the “accept/reject” icon slider for when the Z Flip is folded.

Samsung just showed off the entire Z Flip during its Oscars ad. Small print says screen crease is normal, heh pic.twitter.com/uBesJ0FonT

— nilay patel (@reckless) February 10, 2020

It turns out that the Samsung Galaxy S20 will have to wait until the “Unpacked” event this coming February 11 to have its turn to wow regular users of the brand. For now, it is the Z Flip that is generating the buzz like its first-attempt clunky big brother, Galaxy Fold.

Image from Android Police