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CANESTA, INC.
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LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA – September 18, 2002 – Canesta, Inc., today launched the world's first fully-Integrated projection keyboard for mobile and wireless devices. By integrating a set of tiny Canesta components into such mobile products as smartphones, PDAs, tablet PCs, or cell phones, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) will be able to offer their customers the convenience of a full-sized keyboard and mouse created "out of thin air" by projected beams of light. This eliminates the need for awkward input methodologies such as styluses or thumb keypads. Canesta's revolutionary "electronic perception technology" is then used to track user's finger movements in three dimensions as the user types on the image of a keyboard, projected on any flat surface in front of the mobile device. No accessories are required. This announcement is being made today at the DEMOmobile conference, a leading mobile industry conference taking place in La Jolla, California.
"Mobile and wireless devices have untethered business professionals from their offices, yet so much about mobile technology remains the legacy of desktop computing," said Chris Shipley, executive producer of DEMOmobile. "For example, for real data input, such substantive correspondence, the use of analytical tools, or tasks requiring a high degree of interactivity, nothing has surpassed a traditional, full sized keyboard. With important, new wireless applications emerging, a projection keyboard and mouse, fully Integrated into a pocket-sized mobile device, means that mobile professionals will finally be able to use these devices as easily as they would a desktop computer, and perhaps leave their laptops at home."
The Integrated Canesta Keyboard™ is made possible by the Canesta Keyboard Perception Chipset™, the first commercial realization of Canesta's electronic perception technology. Electronic perception technology is a low cost and practical technology that permits machines and electronic devices of any nature to "see" by tracking nearby objects in three dimensions in real time. The chipset itself, which consists of an invisible light source, a pattern projector for the keyboard, and a unique sensor chip, is designed to unobtrusively be Integrated right into the cases of small mobile devices. The low cost semiconductor manufacturing techniques used for the chipset and its small form factor mean that OEMs may add this capability to today's wireless devices for little or no size penalty at a reasonable cost.
Wireless and mobility expert Andrew M. Seybold, founder and principal of Outlook 4 Mobility, Los Gatos, CA, sees an impact that goes far beyond OEMs. "The ability to finally do PC-like work on a mobile device will undoubtedly have a positive impact on the wireless market," said Seybold. "We would expect in the long term to see not only an across-the-board increase in revenue traffic, but the appearance of new, value-added carrier offerings that take advantage of the capabilities of a full-sized keyboard on a mobile device."
The Integrated Canesta Keyboard is implemented by means of a new type of 3-dimensional sensor technology that can track moving objects in the vicinity of the sensor chip in real time. The packaged sensor, a module not much larger than a pea, resolves a user's finger movements as he or she types on the projected image of a keyboard, resolves those movements into "keystrokes" on specific projected keys, and processes the movements into a stream of serial keystroke data similar to that output by a physical keyboard. This enables an OEM wishing to integrate the sensor module into a mobile or wireless device to do so with great ease, as both the software and hardware interfaces to conventional keyboards are well understood, and well represented with existing code and circuit designs.
Included with the sensor module are two other miniature components: a pattern projector, and a small infrared light source.
The pattern projector, hardly bigger than the sensor module, uses an internal laser to project the image of a full-sized keyboard on a nearby flat surface. The keyboard may be the familiar QWERTY English keyboard, which is offered as a standard option by Canesta, or any non-English or even non-Roman character set, or unique keypads, provided to OEMs on a custom basis.
The light source invisibly illuminates the user's fingers, as they type on the projected surface, such as a desk, tray table, or briefcase.
The three components, collectively called the Canesta Keyboard Perception Chipset, are intended to be mounted directly into the face of the smartphone, PDA, cellphone or other wireless or mobile device, and when in use, consume small amounts of battery power. No separate accessories are required. Users of emerging mobile applications such as wireless email would simply place the mobile device conveniently in front of themselves, and begin typing on the projected keyboard.
The three components comprising the Keyboard Perception Chipset are:
The pattern projector projects a standard or OEM custom keyboard layout onto a nearby flat surface. The keyboard pattern has been optimized for usability, featuring wide key spacing to improve typing accuracy, shortcut keys for popular applications, and adjustable brightness levels. The eye-safe projector, about 9mm (5/16 inch) square, meets U.S. ANSI and IEC Class 1 Laser safety standards.
The small, cylindrical light source, 6.5mm (1/4 inch) in diameter, illuminates the keyboard area with invisible infrared light, which is detected by the sensor module.
The keyboard sensor module serves as the "eyes" of the Integrated Canesta Keyboard, and utilizes Canesta's electronic perception technology to develop a 3-dimensional moving picture of the nearby area. Additional processing built right into the sensor itself translates user finger movements into conventional serial keyboard data, eliminating the need for additional processing in the OEM device. The sensor includes an integral lens that performs all filtering and focusing functions.
The Canesta Keyboard Perception Chipset for the Integrated Canesta Keyboard is available in sample quantities now. An OEM Development Toolkit, consisting of an application test bed with a pattern projector and image sensor, customization tools, sample applications, device drivers, and management and interface software, is also available from Canesta to aid OEMs in fully exploring the range of product opportunities made possible by the Integrated Canesta Keyboard.
Electronic Perception Technology is Canesta's name for a collection of proprietary and patented technologies developed by Canesta to form and process three dimensional images in real time, using ultra-low-cost semiconductor technology. Three dimensional images dramatically simplify the process of identifying objects and separating them from the background in any scene. Classically, developing 3-D images or "depth maps" has required costly, even prohibitively-expensive camera setups and substantial amounts of computing power, which has limited use to extremely narrow applications, such as repetitive assembly tasks, or national security applications, where costs are not an issue.
"We are very excited about the potential of electronic perception technology to change the way people use their mobile and wireless devices," said J. Gerry Purdy, PhD of MobileTrax, a market research firm based in Cupertino, CA. "Moreover, we expect the broad opportunities of this technology to impact a variety of markets that will emerge over the next few years."
Canesta has changed all of this with its electronic perception technology, in which a low-cost, semiconductor-based sensor can actually measure the distance from each "pixel" in the sensor to the nearby object that it represents. This measurement process is so fast that the sensor actually develops moving three dimensional images or depth maps, at better than 50 frames per second, enabling their use in real time applications such as projection keyboards.
The Integrated Canesta Keyboard represents one implementation of electronic perception technology. In this case, keyboard-and-mouse-specific processing tasks are Integrated right in the same chip that contains the 3-D image sensor, simplifying the use of the technology in OEM applications. However, electronic perception technology, which in effect enables machines and electronic devices to "see" and react to their nearby environment, has a much broader scope. It is actively being evaluated by OEMs for security, automotive, military, industrial, medical, gaming, and other applications where "sight-enabling" a device can add new levels of functionality or convenience.
Canesta is the inventor of a revolutionary, low-cost electronic perception technology that enables ordinary electronic devices to perceive and react to nearby objects or individuals in real time.
When sight-enabled with Canesta's unique electronic perception chips and software that sense the environment as 3-dimensional moving images, consumer, automotive, industrial, and medical products will gain functionality and ease of use not possible in an era when electronics were blind.
Canesta was founded in April 1999, and is located in San Jose, CA. The company has filed or has been granted in excess of 30 patents. Investment to date exceeds $20 million, from Carlyle Venture Partners, Apax Partners (formerly Patricof & Co Ventures, Inc.), JP Morgan Partners (formerly Chase Capital Partners), TechFund Capital, and Thales Corporate Ventures (formerly Thomson-CSF Ventures.) Canesta has over 40 employees. Canesta's Web site: www.canesta.com
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Editor's Note: Canesta Keyboard and Perception Chipset are trademarks of Canesta Inc. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are those of their respective companies.
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