One Year Update
Monday June 27th was the official one year anniversary of our completed Kickstarter campaign. Thank you everyone for supporting our project!
Cloud Software
Our software team has been working closely with Foxconn’s software engineers to integrate our cloud features and the firmware in the device. The logistics of our communication and file sharing are less efficient than we would have liked them to be due to the nature of very tight information control on the Foxconn side. Getting this communication set up took some time as we needed to be clever with how we got around these various restrictions. Our team has taken many trips to Taiwan as it is the best way to make progress and we are planning to meet with the Foxconn software team again in July as we finalize everything.
We’re happy to be at such a great place with the software, and although delayed, everything has lined up for long term success. We’ve been able to iterate on the software design and functionality and we’re really proud of where it is headed.
The Phones
The phones look great and we are happy with the overall quality Foxconn has delivered. The packaging design is finalized and we think it will be a really nice surprise for everyone as well.
Currently the Foxconn lab is taking the phones through a series of accelerated life cycle tests (ALT) which will test the phone’s durability in a variety of aspects. There are tests like the “purse test” in which a machine holding a purse with our phone and some common objects like lipstick and keys shakes around to simulate the effects of being in a purse over time. Other tests include thermal shock, scratch resistance of ink (logo and model number), bend test, free drop test, and more.
One of the durability test involves having a robot hand press/release power key over 100,000 times and we have passed. In the most recent drop test, the phone fell to concrete floor from 1.2 meter and survived multiple drops.
All these ALT tests are important for us to deliver a quality phone that will last for the user through a reasonable lifecycle. Not all products go through a proper ALT since it’s costly and potentially fatal to product launch, especially if the device doesn’t pass, and we are proud to have successfully passed and are confident in our little phone.
The Device Software
The other part of the software that we interact with as users is the Light Phone device itself. We’ve been using our Light Phones through the various stages of prototypes, and although a lot of the functionality is there, but we hadn’t finishing building in all of our custom designs within the phone’s interface.
An example is while the phone is turning on we’ve been using the words “BOOTING” followed by “HELLO”. We created this stop animation using the 16 pixel height limitation of the OLED display while turning on the phone:
As we finalize the user experience and wrap up the User Guide website, we will share that with you in July so you can learn everything about the Light Phone and how it works in preparation for getting you phones!
