Imagine if your phone could anticipate your needs and assist you in completing your duties ahead of time. Together, Telekom, the parent company of T-Mobile, and the people at Brain AI have created the Concept AI Phone, which they will be showcasing at MWC 2024. The idea is to replace the well-known app-based workflow and interface with an AI that understands your requests naturally and creates a new user interface (UI) whenever necessary. Though things are now a bit less spectacular in practice, this is nonetheless an intriguing effort to reimagine the smartphone.
The first AI phone without apps
It is simple to explain the notion phone’s idea. Instead of offering you a home screen full of programs, each with a fixed and rigid function, the device, by default, gives you only one option: a large, amiable button that you may press to engage with the built-in Natural AI. Brain refers to this model as the “large action model,” which is primarily driven by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip in the smartphone but can also get data and information from the internet as needed. Instead than requiring you to go between apps in order to accomplish your goals, this AI-based method is meant to prioritize the action you want to do.
Jerry Yue, the inventor of Brain AI, draws comparisons between his vision with the pre-Google functioning of the internet. Instead of using Google to search and get exactly what you need, you would either have to know where to look or read through pages of terms on Yahoo to locate what you want. He believed that this is how applications function. He also believes that applications have the drawback of often being designed with a particular goal in mind, or with the intention of generating user addiction via participation. He wants to use AI to break through these barriers and transform the phone from the reactive concierge it is now—where you have to use the tool thoughtfully—into a proactive one.
A smartphone without apps
The idea phone is obviously still in its infancy in real life, which is perhaps why it’s still just a concept. Only a few use cases that seemed like features you’d only sometimes need were shown by Telekom and Brain. By using both your voice and on-screen interfaces to go through many choices and book your flight immediately, you may utilize the AI to book a flight. In a different example, you could ask the AI to suggest a present for a significant someone in your life, and you could even buy it directly from Amazon. When and how to put up your payment information or mailing address is unclear.The fact that for many individuals, phones serve as their primary means of contact and that social media and messaging are just mentioned in passing is another element that is completely absent from the present demo. That’s perhaps why the staff members were eager to acknowledge during the demonstration that accessing applications on the phone is still possible by simply swiping up to show the app drawer on the home screen. They clarified that even while the idea prioritizes AI input, users still have the option to choose between the AI experience and traditional applications.
That seems like a realistic strategy for the time being, but it’s likely that this may alter in the future. With the AI phone, you won’t be able to completely disrupt the way phones operate in order to force their vision onto people, but you will still be able to access essential features and functions that you may otherwise miss out on.
The fact that for many individuals, phones serve as their primary means of contact and that social media and messaging are just mentioned in passing is another element that is completely absent from the present demo. That’s perhaps why the staff members were eager to acknowledge during the demonstration that accessing applications on the phone is still possible by simply swiping up to show the app drawer on the home screen. They clarified that even while the idea prioritizes AI input, users still have the option to choose between the AI experience and traditional applications.
That seems like a realistic strategy for the time being, but it’s likely that this may alter in the future. With the AI phone, you won’t be able to completely disrupt the way phones operate in order to force their vision onto people, but you will still be able to access essential features and functions that you may otherwise miss out on.
The fact that for many individuals, phones serve as their primary means of contact and that social media and messaging are just mentioned in passing is another element that is completely absent from the present demo. That’s perhaps why the staff members were eager to acknowledge during the demonstration that accessing applications on the phone is still possible by simply swiping up to show the app drawer on the home screen. They clarified that even while the idea prioritizes AI input, users still have the option to choose between the AI experience and traditional applications.
That seems like a realistic strategy for the time being, but it’s likely that this may alter in the future. With the AI phone, you won’t be able to completely disrupt the way phones operate in order to force their vision onto people, but you will still be able to access essential features and functions that you may otherwise miss out on.
This is not the first AI notion that we have encountered. A much more advanced version of this concept is seen in the Rabbit R1, which was unveiled at CES 2024. It doesn’t have any app access at all and has a unique design aspect that sets it apart from Telekom’s concept phone. However, given Telekom and Brain’s approach isn’t limited to not displaying any applications, it seems like it would be a bit more practical in the long term.
In 2021, Brain released its Natural AI as an iPhone app. Ironically, it’s just one more app among millions of others. Though it seems to offer recipes and food, the App Store description suggests that the app’s features are equally constrained. Although the app has a good rating of 4.7 stars, more recent reviews point out issues with the purchase process. Some even label the app as a “scam” and slow. This suggests that Brain and Telekom still have a long way to go before they can create an AI phone you can trust to be your concierge.
