How would people react when they saw someone walking on the road, talking to themselves, tapping their fingers onto thin air and making weird gestures that no one could understand? Anyone would assume they were crazy. But in Kochi, Kerala, the 20-something group of youngsters at RHL Vision, headed by N. Rohildev, would be beaming. They would ask us to observe the supposedly crazy people further, and notice the tiny “ring” on their finger or as they call it the Fin.

So what is the Fin? Fin is a real life buddy for every individual to make their digital interactions as natural as possible a gadget that can be worn on the thumb to make the whole palm a digital touch interface. “People in today’s world are getting stressed out with time management, but still waste a lot of their time on smart devices. Fin removes this interaction gap by allowing users to quickly interact with those devices. A normal person takes out his smartphone from his pocket at an average of 150 times per day, Fin can reduce this number. With this wearable device, people can use it as a universal controller for all their smart devices,” explains Rohildev.

The unique technology used recognises each segment of the finger biometrically that means different functions can be assigned to each finger segment. It makes for endless options answering a call, changing TV channels, switching the music. For the visually-impaired, Fin offers several advantages too: reading out a message, calling someone, asking for directions all with a few taps and swipes of the finger in thin air!Rohildev talks about how they came up with the idea, “We were working on touch-less technology for over eight months and we developed some products in the initial stages.

But we found that it’s too tiring and stressful for prolonged usage. Then we found the boom in revolutionary wearable tech devices the existing devices are mixing both wearable tech and touch-less technology and making it more complex for users. So we thought of making the interaction between these devices and the users as natural as possible. We found that thumb is easily accessible to all other fingers. That’s how we came up with a ring that you can wear on your thumb.”

And not only is their product revolutionary, but also the way they came up with it: a fantastic idea of using crowdfunding site Indiegogo. Rohildev quips, “We had to spread awareness about the technology to the world and I got a splendid chance to introduce Fin to Indiegogo Campaign through TechCrunch Hardware Battlefield. As of now, Fin successfully completed our campaign reaching 202 per cent of our target goal ($202,547 USD) from 1,611 funders and we got a total demand for 2,500 units of Fin.”

The young team was already in the news before for being the only Indian start-up to feature at the Pioneers Festival in Vienna. “RHL Vision Technologies Pvt. Ltd. is a group of passionate individuals incubated at Startup Village, Cochin, and a corporate office as Fin Robotics, Inc at Palo Alto, CA, who dream of a world where technology runs in the palm of your hand. We have a passion to change the way humans interact with technology,” smiles the young visionary.

Rohildev, who is a native of Tirur in Kerala, started the company when he was pursuing his engineering at Kathir College of Engineering, Coimbatore and he has big plans to expand his wonder device. “By the end of June 2014 we will ship our Fin: Dev version to the claimed customers from Indiegogo Campaign and by the end of September 2014 we will ship Fin: Smart version to all the other contributors. We hope to improve our product and keep up the good work much more exciting stuff in store!” he concludes.

SOURCE: Asian Age