New Ultrasonic Fingerprint Reader

Qualcomm boasts a new fingerprint reader using ultrasonic technology. The new prototype was tested in Qualcomm's San Diego headquarters last June. Qualcomm wants to add this technology to upcoming smartphones this year, but remains quiet as to which phones it would be added to. Regardless, companies will have to work in tandem with Qualcomm in order to get their hands on this technology.

Embedding a fingerprint reader used to be the goal of every company. Apple ultimately rid themselves of the technology in exchange for the facial recognition software. However, with these new breakthroughs from Qualcomm, these in-screen readers may return as a prevailing feature in smart phones.

They bounces sound waves off the contour of your finger in order to generate your fingerprint. This allows for a few advantages over existing fingerprint technologies. It can read fingers that are wet as well since the waves pass right through liquid. This also boasts a 1 percent rejection rate and only a lag time of .25 seconds.

The sensor itself is only .15 millimeters which won't add much thickness to phones as seen above. The waves can also be used to track blood flow and heart rate, useful for health applications. 

If this was revealed last June, where is it now? Sadly, this technology only works with flexible OLED displays. Phones currently use rigid OLED, which prevents the waves from working correctly. Apple and Samsung are the only two companies that have a chance to use them, but given legal disputes between Apple and Qualcomm, Samsung is the only option.

Could this new technology debut into Samsung with the Galaxy S10? We will have to see.