Mar 2 2015
FotoNation Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of Tessera Technologies, Inc. and the leading provider of computational imaging solutions for mobile phones and digital still cameras, and ALCATEL ONETOUCH, one of the fastest growing smartphone brands in the world and part of TCL Communication, the sixth largest† mobile phone vendor in the world, have joined forces to take mobile handset auto-focus (AF) systems to a whole new level of speed and quality.
Today, the companies announced that LifeFocus™, FotoNation’s revolutionary auto-focus solution for mobile phones, has been implemented in ALCATEL ONETOUCH’s latest premium smartphone, the IDOL 3, which is expected to start selling in Europe in the second quarter of 2015.
(Photo: Business Wire)
“The premium features of the IDOL 3 go head to head with the best in class performance standard,” said Dan Dery, Chief Marketing Officer of ALCATEL ONETOUCH. “LifeFocus excels in achieving a flawless experience when taking pictures or videos. FotoNation has successfully leveraged over a decade of experience in computational imaging, and we take great pride in working with the best in the digital photography ecosystem.”
“Our partnership with ALCATEL ONETOUCH has allowed us to put game changing AF technology, which exponentially enhances the photography experience, in the grasp of the smartphone end user,” said Sumat Mehra, SVP of Marketing and Business Development at FotoNation. “ALCATEL ONETOUCH is driven by innovation and the desire to provide the best user photography experience with its smartphones. This makes them a perfect partner to bring our novel face-based AF technology to market. ALCATEL ONETOUCH’s IDOL 3 is the first smartphone in the world augmented by LifeFocus to achieve performance that is unmatched by any other smartphone today.”
The vast majority of pictures taken on mobile devices contain people. LifeFocus was built with the human face at its core. FotoNation’s face detection and tracking technologies, already found in 60% of tier-one smartphones, enable face detection auto focus (FDAF). As the foundation of LifeFocus, FDAF works in conjunction with existing state-of-the-art AF solutions based on contrast-, laser- or phase-detection, offering unmatched face focus time and quality, even in low light conditions.
† Market Share Analysis: Devices, Worldwide, 3Q14, Gartner, December 2014