Lenovo Unveils World’s First Tango-enabled Smartphone

Lenovo today launched the much anticipated PHAB2 Pro – the world’s first Tango-enabled smartphone to enable artificial reality (AR) experiences – plus the dual-camera PHAB2 Plus and full-sized PHAB2 smartphones.

Unlike any other phone, the Phab2 Pro, powered by Tango technology – a set of sensors and software from Google that senses and maps its surroundings – makes a host of cutting-edge smartphone augmented reality (AR) experiences possible. For example, using AR apps, students can place true-to-scale virtual dinosaurs in their classrooms and enhance their learning through AR data overlays that appear while they walk around the creatures. AR gaming experiences let you play virtual dominos on your kitchen table, raise a digital pet in your bedroom and fight back swarms of aliens invading your house. With Tango technology PHAB2 Pro can even begin to change the way people think about mapping indoor spaces to create new experiences like future augmented reality museum tours via the GuidiGO app. With Tango, PHAB2 Pro offers unprecedented experiences on a smartphone that will continually learn and improve.

“Put simply, we wanted to take what was an amazing concept and transform it into a commercially viable mobile device,” said Jeff Meredith, vice president and general manager of Android and Chrome Computing, Lenovo. “From the moment we saw Tango, we knew it could become pervasive, just like GPS. However, to truly make PHAB2 Pro a game-changer, we developed it at an affordable price for mainstream consumers, delivering not just a bleeding-edge phone, but an all-around fantastic phone, first to market.”

“Tango enables our devices to sense physical motion and space and, as a result, has the power to change how we interact with our surroundings. We believe that devices with positional tracking functionality will be pervasive and are happy that the PHAB2 Pro will introduces these new capabilities, making your phone even more useful,” said Johnny Lee, Engineering Director at Google.

Homeowners can also now use their PHAB2 Pro to remodel their homes by visualizing real home furnishings in their living rooms and kitchens. Home improvement company Lowe’s is one of the first partners to develop a Tango-enabled application, Lowe’s Vision. The app empowers customers by leveraging Tango technology to measure spaces and visualize how products like appliances and décor, or materials like countertops or backsplash tile, will all look and fit together in a room. With Lowe’s Vision, customers will be able to control a new generation of augmented reality tools with a mere tap of the finger.

“Tango technology will allow customers to see how their home improvement visions translate into reality like never before,” said Richard Maltsbarger, Lowe’s Chief Development Officer. “By bringing the PHAB2 Pro to Lowe’s, we want to empower customers with a tool to help them design, start and complete their home improvement projects with confidence.”

Three core technologies bring Tango experiences to life: motion tracking, depth perception and area learning. Via motion tracking, the PHAB2 Pro’s “eye” sees its own location in 3D. Area learning tells the smartphone its location. Depth perception lets it analyze the shape of the world around it by detecting surfaces and obstacles. And now for the first time ever, your smartphone can visualize and understand its surrounding objects and environment via sensors that capture more than 250,000 measurements a second.