Samsung patent application shows smartphone with laptop dock

A patent application from Samsung shows that the company has ideas about a smartphone that can be slid into a kind of laptop dock. The device runs in smartphone mode on Android, while the laptop mode uses Windows.

The application was discovered by Patently Mobile and was already filed by Samsung last year. The description shows that the Korean manufacturer has devised a kind of laptop dock in which a smartphone can be inserted. The screen of the smartphone can then be used as a trackpad or as a secondary screen. Incidentally, the concept could also function with a small tablet.

According to the patent description, all software requirements are pre-installed on the mobile device. For example, Samsung states that the Android operating system is used in smartphone mode, while Windows is activated when connecting to the laptop. Samsung keeps the option open for the use of other operating systems.

The specifications of the laptop part are not yet known. It is obvious that Samsung chooses to build in a large battery. In the patent description, the manufacturer states that the whole is thinner and lighter than conventional laptops because many hardware components are not needed. However, no further details are given.

Although a patent application indicates that Samsung is thinking about such devices, it is not certain that a smartphone or tablet with a laptop dock will actually come on the market. Not all ideas for which a patent is applied for are available in the shops. Asus did come up with a product in the Transformer line that resembles this: it was a tablet with a keyboard dock in which a smartphone can be inserted.

Furthermore, Google already received a patent for a concept for a smartphone with a laptop dock, but no concrete products have yet emerged. This also concerned two devices functioning separately from each other, which can share a number of functions when linked.