Realfiction announces publication of patent application and International Preliminary Report on Patentability for its ECHO display technology
Realfiction Holding AB (“Realfiction”) announces that the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has today published Realfiction’s ECHO patent application and WIPO’s report on its patentability. The report reaffirms Realfiction’s statement in its 2 July 2020 press release that no prior technique that puts the novelty of the invention into question has been found. Additional clarification was recently provided to WIPO to allow them to fully understand the inventive step behind the ECHO technology.
As usually is the case when examining patent applications for novel and complex inventions, WIPO has requested that Realfiction provides guidance to clarify the so called “inventive step” of the technology. Realfiction and its patent attorney at Budde Schou has done so by providing a “Demand” (reply) to WIPO, and through the filing of 6 additional patent applications for ECHO that describe the invention in more detail. The Demand is attached to this press release so that Realfiction’s shareholders are provided with the most up-to-date information on the patent process as possible.
With the publication of the first patent application, and 6 additional patent applications filed, the ECHO technology now has a strong IP protection shield pending approvals. This allows Realfiction to share a film and images explaining in more detail how the immersive ECHO directional pixel technology works. The film can be found here and on the company's website, while the images are attached to this press release.
“I have worked as a patent attorney specializing in display technology for more than 10 years, and in addition, I have been Examiner at the Danish Patent and Trademark Office. Based on my experience, it is very common that the first initial studying of a patent application by a patent authority leads to a search report postulating a lack of inventive step – at least until the applicant has had an opportunity to file a reply to the search report, and the Examiner can take that into account and have a better basis for forming an opinion. With the Demand for this application sent to the WIPO Examiner, we are expecting a positive reply from the Examiner within a year,” says Brian Jeppesen, patent attorney at Budde Schou.
Following the publication of the first ECHO patent application, Realfiction is progressing with its global patent strategy that will include important markets such as the United States, Europe, China, Japan, and Korea. It can take up to seven years to complete the full patent application process in each country. In some markets, including the United States, the patent process can be completed even if WIPO is in the process of further evaluating the inventive step, and as such, WIPO’s report does not delay Realfiction’s patent strategy.
Realfiction’s WIPO patent application for ECHO with publication number WO/2020/187828, as well as the search report and all other documents related to the WIPO patent application that is now available to the public, can be accessed using WIPO’s IP portal.
A more detailed roadmap for the completion of ECHO will be presented by Realfiction later this fall.
For more information about Realfiction Holding AB, please contact:
Clas Dyrholm, founder and CEO
Telephone: +45 25 22 32 81
Email: clas@realfiction.com
www.realfiction.com
Certified Adviser
Mangold Fondkommission AB is the company's Certified Adviser and can be contacted via ca@mangold.se or +46 8 503 015 50.
About Realfiction Holding AB
Founded in Denmark in 2008, Realfiction is a leading innovator and provider of Mixed Reality solutions and services, a market estimated to reach USD 80 billion by 2025. Realfiction continues to invent technologies within Mixed Reality, with an intention to disrupt the industry by pursuing the vision of converting science fiction into real fiction. Realfiction Holding AB’s share is publicly traded on Nasdaq Stockholm First North under the symbol “REALFI”. The share’s ISIN code is SE0009920994.
About Budde Schou, Patent Attorneys and patent attorney Brian Jeppesen
Budde Schou is one of Scandinavia's oldest full-service firms of IP Attorneys. Budde Schou holds extensive expertise within all aspects of IP and provide IP advice and consultancy services to many national and international clients. Patent attorney Brian Jeppesen is a European Patent Attorney with a Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the Technical University of Denmark and a Master of Science degree in finance from Copenhagen Business School. Brian Jeppesen’s technical expertise is within mechanical and electronic engineering, especially hearing aids, antenna design, signal processing and algorithms, software, electromagnetism, wireless systems and electro optical systems (such as displays). Brian Jeppesen has been employed within the IP industry since 2005 and is a Member of the Examination Committee for the European Patent Office.
About the ECHO technology and the sales/licensing strategy
Realfiction has previously announced the completion of its Proof of Concept and a beta version of an LCD display equipped with its patent pending ECHO technology (supported via a grant from Innovation Fund Denmark). The vision of the ECHO technology is to bring Realfiction’s dream of truly changing the world of 3D into reality.
The ECHO pixel technology is capable of directing light from flat screen displays in different directions, allowing each individual viewer to not only see an image which is different from what others see, but also to experience full 3D depth in that image. The main differentiators between this technology and others in the market or currently under development are that it does not require the use of glasses, that it is planned to become a multi-user system, that the resolution can be ultra-high and that it is not limited to any known standard, that the required image processing is well within the capacity of current standard equipment, and that it can be mass-produced at a low cost. Budde Schou, patent attorney, has previously expressed that the technology holds the potential of cost-efficient mass production while maintaining the high angular precision and the fast response time needed for a high quality, moving image 3D-experience.
To further explain the directional pixel technology, a video illustration can be viewed on the Realfiction website here.
The development of ECHO covers several different display technologies, with OLED being the preferable technology of the future for many reasons. Hence, OLED is therefore the top priority for ECHO. However, since LCD is still the best-selling technology in the TV market, and because it is easier and less costly to develop LCD prototypes, the company developed a beta version of an LCD display with built-in ECHO technology. The main purpose of the beta LCD display is to be able to develop more complete prototypes with faster response time, thereby allowing Realfiction to better showcase the effect and the capacity of the ECHO technology. However, a secondary purpose is to address the currently larger LCD market, which could represent a fast-track towards revenue. One of the problems with LCD is that this technology uses a lot more power than OLED, and the ECHO technology may significantly reduce the power consumption in normal TV use cases. Realfiction estimates that the ECHO technology can reduce the power consumption of displays of the average type televisions by close to 80 %. The estimated reduction adds up to 80 Watt per hour resulting in huge savings of approximately USD 7.4 bN, or 1.34 % of the electricity production equivalent of 56 TWh of electricity and 25 million tons of CO2 in the United States alone. As a result, ECHO has the potential to significantly reduce the annual household consumption of energy, thus adding to lower carbon emissions on a global scale and substantial financial savings.
Assuming Realfiction succeeds in developing this patent pending technology, the company believes it could potentially set a new standard for home entertainment, how we experience TV shows, series and movies on our phones, tablets and TV’s, in comparison to the switch from black and white to colour TV.
The objective is to create a license package and to clarify the production process of the new directional pixels to present a clear path towards commercial mass production of displays comprising millions of such directional pixels. In its final and fully commercial form, the ECHO technology and related content effects will be available at scale and at price points that enable consumer adoption (B2C). However, it is expected that the first working products will target certain industrial (B2B) applications with very specific requirements. ECHO represents a substantial licensing opportunity to Realfiction, due to materialize gradually for different potential use-cases.
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