Samsung Made for India S bike mode

Samsung India Electronics today announced the launch of the Samsung Galaxy J3 featuring the S bike mode, an industry-first dedicated feature for two-wheeler riders that is designed to enable responsible and tension free riding.

Once activated at the beginning of a ride, any caller trying to reach the Samsung Galaxy J3 user will be notified through an automated answering machine that the user is riding and cannot take calls so that the ride remains uninterrupted.

All the user needs to do is to switch on the S bike mode of Galaxy J3 before setting off on the ride, and the smart phone will automatically inform the caller that the user is currently riding a bike and is unable to take the call. The caller may choose to press 1 to express urgency to talk with the biker for which the biker will have to bring his bike to a halt in order to take the call.

“Samsung is constantly in the pursuit of meaningful innovations that make people’s lives better. S bike mode is a result of that vision. While studying the consumers’ phone usage behaviour, we realised that incoming calls are a major distraction to bikers. We are very happy that we have come up with something that will benefit millions of two-wheeler users and promote responsible riding,” said Mr Asim Warsi. Senior Vice President, Samsung India Electronics.

Galaxy J3 is an extension of Samsung’s vision to offer innovative and differentiated products across price segments. The J Series was launched with the Ultra Data Saving (UDS) mode in September 2015, a feature that has helped consumers save up to 50% of mobile data usage. Samsung has further enhanced this feature to include data savings on popular music streaming apps and over Wi-Fi after witnessing an adoption rate of over 50% among consumers. In order to carry the local innovation forward, Samsung is keen to establish the S bike mode as a responsible riding ritual where Samsung Galaxy J3 users will activate the mode before commencing their ride. Both UDS and the newly launched S bike mode have been developed in Samsung’s Indian R&D centres. S bike mode will be available across all 4G-enabled Galaxy J series devices over a period of time.

“Innovation at Samsung revolves around the consumer as we aspire to bring a complete hardware and software solution. Samsung Galaxy J3 is the first affordable segment device that has been equipped with NFC hardware to activate the S bike mode with a single tap of the device on  a S bike NFC tag that will be shipped with every unit. The revolutionary S bike mode has been designed in India by our engineers to not only propagate responsible riding which is a concern for both consumers and government authorities, but also ensure a tension free ride,” Mr. Dipesh Shah, Senior Vice President, Samsung R&D Institute India.

How the S bike mode Works

S bike mode was developed and built into the Galaxy J3 following extensive market research aimed to create innovations that are really meaningful and useful to people. 

This is how it works:

Step 1 – Quick Activation: Galaxy J3 has in-built NFC hardware and the device ships with an S bike mode NFC Tag. This tag can be affixed at a convenient place (eg. helmet or a fuel tank) and the user can gently tap the device on this tag to activate/deactivate the S bike mode. The user also has the option to use the quick panel to activate/deactivate this feature.

Step 2 – Urgent Call Alert System: All callers hear a pre-recorded message that informs callers that the Galaxy J3 user is riding a two-wheeler and is unable to take the call. The S bike mode user does not get any notification that there was an incoming call (to avoid distraction). In case the call is urgent, the caller may choose to press 1, which allows urgent calls to go through.

Step 3 – Motion Lock: This feature ensures that if the S bike mode user decides to take the urgent incoming call, he will need to bring his bike to a halt to be able to answer the call. The phone will not allow the incoming call to get answered owing to motion lock. This safety feature is designed to encourage responsible riding.

The S bike mode also sports an intuitive user interface where users can see a log of call notifications while the mode is enabled. It also has a Smart Reply feature where selected contacts will receive an auto-SMS with an estimate of when the user is likely to be available for a call basis a trip destination entered by the user. There is also a dashboard of time and distance travelled using the S bike mode where users stand a chance to win up to INR 1,500 per month from Freecharge for being a responsible rider.

Price and Availability

Samsung Galaxy J3 is priced at INR 8,990 and will be available in three colour options of gold, black and white exclusively on Snapdeal from March 31^st 2016. 

Source: Press Release