In: Economics
What are major options of redesign? Interpret the evolution of telephone handset from rotary dial phone to smartphone from the perspective of successive redesigns. What are the major technology cores supporting this series of redesigns? Explain the evolution of those technologies.
Redesigning is designing something again or in some different
way than the original. It doesn't imply changing the whole thing.
The major options or choices involved in redesigning are reworking,
consolidation and elimination. Reworking implies to work with the
available features and properties in a different way. Consolidation
means combining two or three features having different skills into
one so that both the operations are fulfilled in a single take. And
finally, elimination is getting rid of the features that no longer
proves to be effective and can be replaced by something
better.
So, let us take a closer look into how rotary dial phones have evolved into smartphones and the successful redesigns that have taken place over the years and the technology associated with it:
1) Rotary Dial: The rotary phone came into existence in the
1930's and it was a redesign over the candlestick phone. In this
phone, the mouth piece and the reciever was combined into a single
unit unlike its predecessor. The dial would be rotated to the
number needed via holes and then the dial would be released.
2) Touch Dial phone: In 1963, the first ever electronic touch dial
phone system was released by the Bell System and it came with touch
tone dialling. Different audible tones for each of the digits on
the push button keypad were provided. Each row and column came
designated with different frequencies. The tones helped the
switching centre determine which key was pressed.
3) First mobile phone: In the april of 1973, Motorola came out with the first mobile telephone DynaTAC 8000x from a handheld equipment. It weighed about 2.4 lbs and provided the caller a talk time of 30 mins and took 10 hours to get fully charged.
4) Cordless phone: These became super popular in the 1980's as
the handset cord of the telephone bevame replaced by a radio link.
The 80's were very beneficial for telephones due to first testing
of VoIP service and caller ID.
5) First portable phone: The first portable mobile phone came
out in 1989 and was known as MicroTAC 9800x. It came with a new and
innovative flip design, as the mouthpiece folded over the keypad.
Both the ringer and the mouthpiece was located at the base of the
phone. Before this, mobile phones were used and installed in cars
as they did not fit into pockets. This weighed half the amount
compared to the prior motorola phone and no buttons would be
pressed when not in use. It had a storage of 30 numbers and a
standby of 30 hours.
6) Nokia: Right from the middle of the 90's until the 2000's , nokia came out with mobile phones that attracted consumers with interchangeable faceplates, customized designs, the first ever WAP browser, internal antenna, text messaging, an LCD screen and internet connectivity. This was the Nokia 1011, the first ever GSM phone, made use of digital networks rather than analog. This allowed text messaging but there was a 160 character limit. It had a dual line display and 99 contact storage.
7) First camera phone: This was the Sanyo SCP-5300 which came in a
clunky clamshell design and would capture photos of 640 * 480
pixels in 2000. It also had basic flash, self timer, various
filters like sepia, black and white, white balance control, and
digital zoom.
8) Crackberry: Blackberry released their popular RIM communication
device in 2003. This held a phone, PDA and email system
incorporated into a hand-held phone. Users could constantly check
emails and send short messages via this device.
9) Sleek mobile: Motorola Raze came out in 2003 and had a sleek
and thin profile. They were sold over 130 million in 4 years and
became best selling.
10) Smartphones: Blackberry, HTC, Windows, Samsung, Noki amd Motorola popularized smartphone since early 2000's. These phones had the capacity to email, fax and internet. There were sliding, flipping, rotating, and many multiple keyboards, touchscreen phones etc. There was also the introduction of the stylus. Then iphone came out with its first touch screen in june 2007. It came with multimedia functions, email and web browsing features, large colour display, finger friendly user interface amd a single button on its face.