##. The big handicap of LG at that time: The launch of this product was still 10~12 months in the future, was definitely not going to be a high-volume product and the brand needed investment in many countries to carry such a premium device.

Meanwhile sales of the last flagships LG G8, V50, V60 was behind expectations, the period required a massive increase in R&D investment to commercialize 5G technology and Chinese vendors (Xiaomi, Oppo/Vivo/OnePlus, Lenovo) made a huge push into international carrier-markets.

It was all on thin ice already, but there were also some great Mid/High-tier devices in the pipeline, LG was in the lead for commercializing 5G in many markets and had a few aces up its sleeve for the coming quarters like this rollable device.

Then COVID came. Global Sales of the industry collapsed, everything became slower and also semiconductor pricing exploded.

The companies which made it through COVID better than others were those who already had solid brands and high-volume sales before that period. They had the warehouses filled with tested and launched devices, they cut a bit on profit, increased a bit on price and prepared a semi-hibernation mode.

LG's mobile division was not in such a state in most markets. It wasn't profitable for several quarters at this point, and it was clear that it won't be profitable for several quarters to come.

##. Rollables are most-likely not "a thing" today, because LG did so much fundamental research on this and owns many of the relevant patents.

The key tech is less in the panel itself than the supporting structure (the skeleton supporting and stabilizing the panel, you can also see this in the R&D involved in the hinge-tech of folding devices)

Oppo (and Lenovo iirc) were presenting similar rollable form-factors on roadshows or press-events ~2019, but this was prior to the patents (especially [0]) being granted, likely also used the OLED Panel from LG Display (but I'm not sure the designs were actually considering durability as much as LG already did at this stage)

[0] https://patents.google.com/patent/EP3506247A1

[1] https://patents.google.com/patent/WO2014123272A1

[2] https://patents.google.com/patent/US10564676B2

Also reminds me of the rollable map screen from Red Planet (2000).

As seen here: http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News.asp?NewsN...

Came here to say this. Glad to see it already posted. I remember going to CES every year in the mid/late 00’s, and always badgering vendors about their roll up oled advances, bend radius, tensile strength, impact resistance, failure behavior, etc… after a few years it became clear to me the inherent fragility wasn’t going to make it practical for use cases I wanted. Guess I’ll get comfy and keep waiting for a display tech closer to a textile.

I liked the slide down mechanism of the nokia 7110 also. Bonus points for the microphone being at the bottom of it so it served a purpose by putting the mic really close to the mouth (unlike later sliders like the banana phone which didn't do this)

I loved the Xiaomi Mi Mix 3 slide mechanism.

The front camera was hidden and you would slide the back up to expose it. Was not motorized and functioned using magnets. Very similar to what old dumb phones used. Super reliable and easy to use.

The slide out cam on the One Plus 7 Pro was exceptional. I still miss it sometimes.

I liked the Startac and Razr formfactor.

Those are YouTube ads. YouTube shows more ads in embedded videos than when watched on YouTube itself.

https://citl.news.niu.edu/2024/07/08/upcoming-changes-to-you...

Huh. I didn't get those ads.

LG got it right with the original Nexus 4, although battery life was a problem for all phones in that era. That phone had everything in a small form factor and it also came with a glass back that enabled the phone to fall off a perfectly level service, which was rectified with a little rubber piece.

The Nexus 4 should have lofted LG into the big league and the Nexus 4 owner should have graduated to a LG flagship. But this didn't happen, in part because people stayed with Google and moved on to what would become the Pixel series.

The problem with smartphones is that they are ultimately 'hand rectangles' and the average customer only needs adequate rather than super-deluxe. For a while it was possible to compete on features, battery life and mega-pixels, for people to queue outside phone retailers to be first with the new status-symbol-gadget. But times changed as the tech matured.

Most people couldn't care less about their phone specifications, so long as it works. Getting the latest and greatest phone makes as much sense as on insisting on the latest model of hand basin or the most hi-tech garden trowel. Who cares apart from reviewers or people with little going on in their lives.

LG never really recovered after releasing several phones with bootlooping issues between 2015-16: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_smartphone_bootloop_issues

Plus their software support was poor, even for the era.

My first LG ended up being my last LG because it was defective. Screen issues started popping up about a year after purchase. Sending it in repairs didn't accomplish anything. They probably returned the same phone to me untouched since the screen issues would go away if the phone wasn't used for a few weeks (but it would always come back). While other people had similar issues, LG never acknowledged the problem. It was not confidence inspiring.

In terms of what the phone delivered between software and hardware: it was a wonderful phone, but I lacked confidence in the brand to buy another.

In contrast, I have never had a defective phone from another company. Heck, I've only had two phones that ended up with cracked screens (and those were clearly my fault).

The V series were always my favorite - also moved to iOS after owning a V60.

Never used it with the dual screen case as it was too large. But funnily enough I now use it all the time as a pro music player, remote for my Tv, tablet, etc. The dual screen is actually very well implemented and so is the "desktop" mode if you plug it in via usb-c to a big screen. The thing even shoots 8K video !

LG was way ahead of the time.

I can't really speak for other Android users, but in those eras I either owned or was paying more attention to the HTC, Samsung, Motorola, Pixel, etc. phones because of their aftermarket OS support.

I really liked the G2 as well. It was the first phone (at least that I saw) to put the power and volume buttons on the back of the phone, where a ton of later phones would eventually start putting the fingerprint sensor.

I replaced LG's ROM with CyanogenMod back in the day, and it was such a smooth experience. The main reason I moved on from it was because I cracked the screen and the replacement screen I got (installed by a local repair shop) had a touch sensitivity issue along the top edge.

My LG G3 overheated so much that the screen unglued itself from the case.

Sent it to warranty 3 times, but it happened again every time. The middle of the screen got so hot I could barely hold my finger there.

I liked my LG phones until I broke a screen and the cost to get a replacement was absurd because noone has them in stock.

I am still kind of shocked that the non-leading manufacturers haven't standardized on hardware. Every company besides Apple, google, and Samsung, should get together and create the beige box computer of cell phones, you can get influencers modding them, gamers overclocking, etc. all the things that keep the desktop market alive.

Instead of working together, every one of these companies acts like a greedy monopoly when they don't have monopolistic powers, or even any soft form of lock-in. Even if all they did was make phones that had easy to replace standardized screens and batteries. I could see them quickly making in-roads in corporate IT, and for kids.

But none of them want to work together, so we get iphones, a few higher end iphone ripoffs, and a bunch of low end iphone ripoffs.

edit: I'm also mad that I lost my cat S61, and that the S62 looks like everything else.

edit 2: I also hate that I switched to an iphone, and how comfortably easy it was to get full locked-in in two years.

The impression I got was "too many parts, too much to go wrong, too expensive to build".

It doesn't rule out that other people might have better ideas, but it does suggest why LG decided it wasn't worth it.

I think the article gets at it indirectly: a complex mechanism with multiple motors, tracks, arms, etc, substantially more complicated and thus more failure-prone than any folding phone ever and also substantially more expensive to make.

The batteries have to be rigid. That's the problem at the moment.

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idk, debatable.

The last few times I bought a phone for myself or the company my main question was how low the price per years of software support is. Then I pushed the proposals up for approval and they asked me... the same thing.

Yeah, one trip to the beach, and it's all seized up/scratched.

Lenovo has a laptop with a rolling screen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GsJi1KvHhA