“The US Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 22 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today,” Jack Purcher reports for Patently Apple.
“The most interesting patent came to us as a complete surprise this morning as it wasn’t originally covered,” Purcher reports. “More than likely, the patent was filed in a way so as to escape the regular channels.”
Purcher reports, “The good news is that this patent advances Apple’s new antenna system from previous applications. We were first introduced to Apple’s intentions for a Telephonic MacBook back in August 2010. This was followed up with two related granted patents for a cellular antenna for a MacBook that were published respectfully in September 2010 and February 2011. Apple continues to advance the concept of a Telephonic MacBook which will hopefully see the light of day sometime in the future – hopefully sooner rather than later.”
Much more in the full article, including Apple’s patent application illustrations, here.
Is there an application for such an antenna OTHER than a telephonic one? Perhaps something no one has ever thought of. That would be a lit like an Apple move.
Over the air TV? Other than that, you got me.
Antenna’s can broadcast as well as receive. Hmmmm
Just thinking out loud. Honestly, I can’t really see a tremendous value in putting a phone in a laptop when there are iPhones (4, 5, 6, etc.) and iPads.
what if this is just some 3g/4g antennae for data?
you know, intead of buying those usb 3G cards.. its built into the macbook.
they might have been respectfully published, but i think they meant respectively.
With osx and ios converging in the near future (first phase Lion), it would seem logical that hardware will also start to converge. If you think about it, the processors in future iPads will be powerful enough to run osx, therefore I predict a future where you will have laptops with 10inch screens, running osx, then when you want even more portability you simply clip off the screen and voila you have iPad running ios. All the chips in the screen just like iMac. When apple do that they will sell hundreds of millions and completely own the portable Market. I predict 12 months.
and in the 17″ MBP, the pccard slot will be replaced with an iPhone slot to offer mobile data without tethering.
Or you could tether to your Blackberry and save Apple a lot of R&D money.
I like the idea but I’d like it on a MacBook air tablet combo. That’s what I want, Apple.
Imagine an iPad 2 like smart cover for macbooks, over and above the antenna idea, that could be used to suck up solar power. The idea is presented in patently apples smart cover trademark report this morning. It’s an interesting idea.