IIT Kanpur develops novel Haptic Smart Watch for the blind and visually impaired

Standing tall on their vision for developing innovative tech and putting it to use for improving lives, IIT Kanpur recently entered into a technology transfer MoU with Ambrane India Private Limited for mass manufacturing and sales of the haptic smart watch for the blind and visually impaired.

The aid watch was developed in the leadership of Prof. Siddharth Panda and Mr. Vishwaraj Srivastava from the National Centre for Flexible Electronics at IIT Kanpur.

The haptic watches that are currently available for the blind and the visually impaired can be classified into four categories - tactile, talking, vibration, and braille-based. They have been built with a 12 touch sensitive hour markers on the dial face. The user is required to scan the markers with his/her fingers. For instance, to check the time at 3:40, the 3rd and 8th marker in the watch will be termed as the active markers and a vibration pulse will be generated on touching them. A long pulse on 3 will indicate hours and a short pulse on 8 will indicate minutes for checking the time of 3:40.

Furthermore, the smartwatches have also equipped with smart features to indicate health parameters like heart rate, step count, hydration reminder and smart timer to set short timer accessible by simple gesture. These watches developed at IIT Kanpur addresses the drawbacks of all the conventional technologies and offers a seamless experience to the wearer. Once commercialised by Ambrane India, let’s hope that these too-good-to-be-true timepieces are available in the market at affordable prices.