DRESDEN, Germany Plastic Logic will roll out an e-book reader based on its proprietary backplane technology at next year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. In contrast to competing devices from Amazon and Sony, the Plastic Logic reader will focus on business users' needs.
At a presentation during the Semicon Europa, Plastic Logic which runs its production in Dresden, showed a prototype of the reader and provided technical details. The reader will be designed to combine with a smartphone or similar mobile broadband device for wireless connectivity. Unlike available e-book readers, the Plastic Logic device is intended to be part of a corporate IT environment and offer users the possibility to edit and modify the content. It will be equipped with a 10" monochrome SVGA touchscreen display, offering a resolution of 150 ppi.
Since the display content is bi-stable it only consumes energy at moments when the display is changed. For this reason, the battery lifetime will range from several days up to one week, a company spokesperson said. Only the backplane of the display panel will be manufactured by Plastic Logic; the front panel will be bought from e-Ink. Since the display unit is based on organic electronics and does contain neither glass nor silicon components, the reader will be very robust, the company announced.
The company declined to provide details on the microprocessor to be used. It also did not elaborate on the price to be expected. "We have to be competitive", the presenter said.
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