Car manufacturer Nissan has announced what it’s calling the world’s first self-healing iPhone case. It uses Nissan’s Scratch Shield paint, which was developed several years ago in collaboration with the University of Tokyo and Advanced Softmaterials Inc. The paint is currently an option on a number of Nissan vehicles including the Murano, 370Z and X-Trail.
This is the first time Nissan’s self-healing paint technology has been used on a non-automotive product in Europe, although it’s already been licensed to mobile operator NTT DoCoMo in Japan for use on the Style Series N-03B mobile phone.
Scratch Shield paint uses a polyrotaxane, which returns to its original shape after being scratched. Small scratches will close themselves and ‘heal’ in as little as an hour, with bigger scratches sometimes taking up to a week.
Bob Laishley, Overseas Programme Director Business Development for Nissan in Europe, said “We like to think laterally by taking the great innovations we’ve got from an automotive point of view, and looking at how they could be applied to improve everyday issues. The Scratch Shield iPhone case is a great example of us taking a Nissan automotive technology that has had a huge impact for our customers, and then shifting the boundaries to apply it to another everyday product.”
An initial batch of prototype Scratch Shield iPhone cases has been produced for beta testing with selected journalists and customers. The cases will go on sale to the public if demand proves strong enough.