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Emergency Phone With a Surprising "Screen"

NextOfKin Creatives' SpareOne Phone

By Rain Noe - September 17, 2021

in Object Culture

Here's a phone with a rather surprising object where you're expecting to see numbers or icons:

That's the SpareOne Phone, designed by Singapore-based design consultancy NextOfKin Creatives for client XPAL Power, Inc. The brief was to design a "full functioning emergency phone powered by a single AA with a 15 year shelf life."

"As the product did not have any LCD information display, the archetype of the display screen was used to showcase the hero of this device - the iconic long lasting AA battery.

"We designed an intuitive layout with the Emergency button (for SOS calls) being the center of the button interface. The other features we rationalized necessary were a slim form factor, tactile button designs, programmable phone-number memory and the universal LED torchlight."

Simple and basic, battery front and center, I like it. The placement of the battery is such that you can see the expiration date at a glance. As for ergonomics, it's not like you're supposed to have an hour-long gab-fest with a college buddy on this thing and I'm okay with the bulge.

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Hilary Ann

3 years ago

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I have tracked you down because I wanted very much to say thank you. I owe you a huge debt of gratitude for the VSSMB. THANK YOU for keeping it up and accessible. There is nothing else like it, not even close.

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Larry Cadloff

3 years ago

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This is not a new product - I’ve had one in my emergency kit for almost ten years. It’ll work with almost any SIM, including the one that’s probably in your everyday phone (there are adapters in case your SIM is a micro or nano size). It’ll even work with no SIM at all for emergency 911 calls .

It’s a great idea, with one major issue: it’s a 2G GSM phone. This was once the de facto worldwide standard, but carriers are starting to shut down their aging 2G networks; my own carrier, for example, will drop GSM service by the end of 2022.

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Lis Riba

3 years ago

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A bit dubious the SIM card will still work (be supported; connect to a still extant carrier) after 15 years

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- W Scott Murphy
  
  Lis Riba
  
  3 years ago
  
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  Indeed- it was about 5 years after launch that the 2G networks used by the single-AA version started being retired. Even the updated 2-AA version released a few years later (with 3G) won't be much use after those networks are retired next year.
  
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