Tab
Designer: Bertrand Clerc
Year: 2007
Object type: Mobile phone, interface.
Dimensions: 108 × 56 × 14 mm
Project type: School project
"What a poor plagiarism of the iPhone" is what you probably thought at first sight.
This proposition is one result from a partnership project that my class had with Orange who was looking for new products, services and ideas.
My goal was to design a mobile phone that focuses on the elderly people as these devices are overloaded with functions and complicated interfaces.
My idea was to simplify the product by providing the very minimum at first and then gradually evolve the features to enable its user a tranquil adaptation.
The result is a simplified device that features a big touch sensitive e-ink display.
When turned on for the first time, only one page appears: the 'tabs' tab. This is where the user will select his first functions such as the 'call' tab, the 'clock' function. Then he will possibly purchase a monthly subscription for the 'music' tab, or movies. And so on.
The tab arrangement makes the interface easily understandable.
IPhone and similarities.
The Tab phone project was completed a few days before the iPhone showed up for the first time.
They share very similar aspects, the first ones being obviously the form factor and the full touch display. The other one is the simplified tab interface that can be compared to the iPhone's App Store and the device's menu.
It can sound random or to good to be true at first but they probably were some similarities in my approach and Apple's one. The wish to simplify the experience sure had its impact in the final proposal.
