I was in my toilet shitting and reading the newspaper when I came across this article from The Straits Times .....A phone for the elderly
Made-in-Singapore handset will make its debut at the PC Show starting today
A SIMPLE-TO-USE cellphone, targeted at the elderly and children, looks set to be the potential star of the PC Show.The phone's maker, Foresight Technologies, a Singapore company, will be making its debut at the electronics fair, which starts today.
Unlike most current mobile phones that have tiny, dinky buttons, the iNo Mobile has buttons at least three times bigger, so the elderly can press them easily, as well as a torch.
There is a special SOS button on the back of the handset so that if an elderly person gets into trouble, pressing the single button will send emergency calls and text messages to four pre-programmed numbers.
And when the button is released, the phone will also sound a siren to attract attention.
The company's director, Mr Kenneth Lau, wants to 'aggressively increase awareness' of the $78 phone at this year's show.
Organisers expect more than one million people to stream through the doors over its four days.
The PC Show is the second major electronics fair here, following one in March. Two others are also usually held in September and December respectively.
More than 600 exhibitors, including familiar international names such as Epson, Apple and Lenovo, have taken booths at the Suntec City event, which has promotions on anything from pocket-sized projectors to home theatre systems and global positioning devices.
About 1.1 million people visited the same show last year, spending more than $51.7 million in total.
Source: The Straits Times - A Phone for the elderly
I was quite interested in this article because ...
Firstly, I just found out that there are actually Singaporean companies producing mobile phones. The featured company even sold 100,000 sets worldwide which I think is pretty good for an unknown local company. However in Singapore, it has only sold 1,000 sets.
Secondly, the concept of the phone is quite similar to the phone that my group mates and I came up with for one of our marketing projects 2 years ago!! We were supposed to tie up with a company not in the mobile phone industry and come up with a new mobile phone. We chose to collaborate with Osim (of course fake one as it is just a project) and come up with a phone to target the elderly.
This is what we wrote in our mini intro
"The mobile phone business, since its launch has never slowed down one bit. When we did some general research on the mobile phone market in Singapore, we realized that there was no phone that was singly designed for the elderly in Singapore. With the baby boomers in their twilight years, we agreed that we would design and market a phone to the elderly. To reach out to the elderly, we decided to collaborate with Osim- a household name for health products in Singapore."Here is the poster I made for the phone he he.
Lets compare ...
Name
Their phone is called iNo Mobile ours is called hPhone both equally lame and seems to be inspired (ours obviously is) by the "iPhone". They use the "i" of the iPhone and we used the "Phone" lol. I think hPhone stands for health phone, forgot about the meaning but actually, the right name for an Osim product would be uPhone he he, forgot why we didn't use that.
Main Features
iNo Mobile:
- Big buttons
- Torch Light
- Special SOS button to send emergency calls and text messages to 4 pre-progammes numbers
- SOS button also acts as a siren.
- Digital Time announcer
- Shortcut dialing
hPhone:
From the poster you can see that ...
- We have big buttons too
- We have a similar SOS button called The emergency button. It does the same thing.
- We also have a simple to use speed dial which I think is similar to their shortcut dialing
Other features we have but not the iNo
- We have a bigger screen which large fonts
- The iNo Mobile has a digital time announcer but we have a Narrator program!
The phone is equipped with a ‘Narrator’ program that verbally announces each program or phone function that the user opens up or accesses. It is meant as an aid for users who are unable to read or understand certain words but can be disabled for users who have no need for it.
The hPhone displays and narrates text in English, Mandarin, and Malay as well, and is useful for those who are fluent in languages other than English. The volume of the ringtones and sounds are louder for those that are harder of hearing, though the volume can be adjusted.
- We have a rubber grip to ensure that they have a better grip on the phone
- Health Tips
- The hPhone can also store the user's particulars such as their blood type, allergies, and number of next-of-kin, name, as well as the contact number of the user’s family doctor or hospital. All these information can be accessed with a simple shortcut button.
Anyway, I hope this company succeeds and go on to sell many iNo Mobiles cause it will prove that there is really a market for mobile phones for the elderly heh. It would be great for a local mobile phone to make it big too.
I do think that it would be better if they could somehow collaborate with Osim and release it under the Osim brand though. Better brand image he he, you know when you have a phone like this, it is important to give people the feeling that it is of high quality and won't spoil when the user needs it most. Osim has many retail outlets around Singapore too, easier to showcase the product. The Osim brand plus celebrity endorsement from TVB or local Celebrity uncle or aunty and you have a winner! You can sell it much more than $78 and people will still buy it! Just my 2 cents ha ha =P.
hPhone - It cares for you =)
(Images Taken From: The Straits Times online, my school project)