Project Soli – The Smartwatch With Radar for Gesture Controls

When it comes to smart technology we are getting a whole array of technology that proves interesting and usable on an everyday basis. Amongst these smart devices exist the smartwatches, they look like watches but contain the functionality and abilities of a mobile phone. When it comes to controlling a smartwatch you are often limited to the touch screen and a few select buttons on the device, that was until Google decided that the answer was a radar system.

Under the title of Project Soli, Googles engineers at the Advanced Technologies and Projects division (ATAP) were able to insert a small radar device into a smartwatch, offering users the ability to control devices through fine movement without a physical control. Offering gesture based recognition like that found in the Kinect in devices as small as a smart watch, the original idea came from just proving that you could use a radar in small devices.

As Ivan Poupyrev, the technical lead for Project Soli stipulated “if you can put something in a smartwatch, you can put it anywhere”. The idea for gestures came from interactions with your own fingers, meaning that while you are seeing the impact of your gestures on your phone you can also feel them, something that often benefits users when controlling systems.

Would you be interested in a watch that you can control with the wave of your hand?