Man invents watch for the blind

The watch was designed for both sighted and visually impaired people, allowing people to tell the time by touching the piece.

The design indicates hours and minutes through two rotating ball bearing set in concentric grooves around the timepiece’s face and perimeter. The ball’s positions are measured against raised hour indices around the face. All is connected by magnets to the Swiss quartz movement, and the balls can be realigned by twisting the wrist.

Hyungsoo, who founded his own company Eone, both to develop and sell the device, had the idea for this innovation during a class at MIT, when a blind class mate asking him the time. The entrepreneur noticed a was wearing talking watch that said the time out loud when he pressed the button, which was not convenient for all daily life situations.

“I went home that afternoon and spent the whole day googling “watch for the blind” hoping to discover something better. But they don’t exist! I found some cool tactile watches, but they were all “concept only” and didn’t exist in real world. That surprised me quite a bit. It’s the 21st century, and there are still many people out there for whom checking time is a huge challenge. All the watches and clocks available require vision. None of them work if you can’t see”, the inventor recalled.

With the help from designers and engineers, he came up with a prototype (was a bulky braille watch with dots that changed their combination each minute).

To further develop the product, Hyungsoo launched a Kickstater campaing, which allowed him to get nearly $600,000.

The piece can be bought online from 309€.

Adapted from: http://nyti.ms/2vyt2L8

More info: https://www.eone-time.com
https://youtu.be/e32wEt3iJhA