Vivo and Qualcomm have debuted new fingerprint sensing technology that will enable future smartphones to embed fingerprint readers beneath their displays.
We’ve previously reported on both Apple and Samsung’s burgeoning efforts in developing fingerprint scanners that can sit beneath the primary display of a smartphone, and now at Mobile World Congress 2017 in Shanghai, both Vivo and Qualcomm have debuted their own take on the technology.
Vivo debuted its solution working aboard its Xplay 6 smartphone, and claimed that its embedded fingerprint scanner doesn’t require a physical button to function and is, accordingly, the “the first to be demonstrated by a smartphone manufacturer”.
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Vivo offered that its embedded fingerprint scanner enables the module to sit beneath a full-screen display, unibody, and a mechanical waterproofing design – meaning that if rival manufacturers can iterate on the technology Vivo has presented, future flagship smartphones could retail their design smarts and still benefit from a front-facing fingerprint scanner.
Vivo offered that as part of its Research and Development plan, “fingerprint scanning will not be carried out by an independent button or region. It will be realised more subtly under the screen, behind the metal shell, or even in the frame… Based on ultrasonic technology, the fingerprint recognition technology can be further expanded to realize user interaction, such as gesture recognition, security verification and other fields, which will greatly enhance user experience.”
Not to be outdone, Qualcomm has similarly announced the development of new Advanced Fingerprint Scanning and Authentication Technology, which would lead to new fingerprint scanners that will not only be able to work through displays, thick layers of glass and even metal, but further work underwater and detect a user’s heartbeat and blood flow.
Qualcomm has claimed that its technology will be able to scan through an OLED display comprised of stacks “up to 1200um”, and that its new fingerprint scanners will be made available to device manufacturers this month – meaning that devices leveraging such modules could arrive as soon as the first half of 2018.
Apple is rumoured to have succeeded in its efforts to include an embedded fingerprint scanner aboard the premium iPhone 8, and Samsung has similarly been tipped to introduce such a feature on the forthcoming Galaxy Note 8 in August this year, given the company’s failure to settle the feature for inclusion aboard the Galaxy S8.
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