Samsung is ahead of any other company in terms of foldables and it continues to patent new designs and utilities. Similarly, companies that haven’t released any foldable device yet are also patenting for a while now. One of those firms is Xiaomi and its software department has filed another design patent for a foldable smartphone.
This new foldable smartphone design patent was filed by Beijing Xiaomi Mobile Software with the CNIPA (China National Intellectual Property Administration) in April. It got approved and published on October 23. As usual, it was spotted by none other than LetsGoDigital.
The documentation for the new Xiaomi patent describes an inward folding foldable smartphone with a slider cover display. In other words, this design is a fusion of Galaxy Z Fold2 and Mi Mix 3.
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First of all, the design looks identical to the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold series. However, the inward folding display does not have any notch or punch hole. Even the outer cover screen lacks them because the front-facing dual-camera and earpiece are hidden below the slider panel.
Further, the back of the device includes a quad-camera setup, power key and volume rockers on the right side, and a microphone as well as a SIM card slot on the top. Since none of the diagrams show the bottom of the phone, we are not sure what else that holds.
Having said that, we don’t think Xiaomi will ever launch this kind of foldable smartphone. Because foldables are already costly and adding a slider display will further increase the cost as well as weight.
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