This Tiny Computer Turns Anything Into A Smart Device

Today, we connect with our loved ones and access information through touch displays and screens. There is a tight relationship between digital tools and our vocation: the way we write code lines or words. Now, director of engineering Ivan Poupyrev at Google’s Advanced Technology and Products division is about to rewrite the modern tech’s binary using a super small computer.

Poupyrev came up with this idea from one fact that computers play a critical role in most of our work and personal lives but is still restricted to a bunch of gadgets limiting their potential. Ultimately, he wants to turn every object we interact with every day into their own computer interfaces.

Last week, he went on Ted Talk stage to talk about his vision in a 20-minute talk. He said that tiny computers can help craftspeople, tailors, and artisans turn their traditional tools into new hardware and computers that they could never think of.

As per Poupyrev’s explanation, there are a few electrodes on the computer’s back, when we plug the device into two different objects, it will know where it’s plugged in and adjust itself to enable certain functions. He wants to offer makers of things with this device to use like a zipper or button.

The research is going on under Google’s Project Jacquard, the venture Poupyrev established in 2014 as an effort to combine technology and fabric. Back in 2017, the business partnered with Levi’s to make the first smart jacket in the world which Poupyrev used during his Ted Talk to control his slide show. He also said that the next step is to help every designer recreate Google’s achievement with Levi’s.

With this tiny computer, Poupyrev hopes that craftspeople can incorporate digital services into their products. He also clarified that instead of applying this on each product, one by one, he wants to cover all daily items with digital functionality.