New charger design: Folding mode activated!

One scratch to a laptop is all it took for designer Min-Kyu Choi to redesign the power plug – with award-winning results. He and his business partner Matthew Judkins talk to BBC Future about a simple but ground-breaking rethink.

 

 

The UK power plug is a design which has remained almost unchanged since it started being plugged into electrical outlets in 1947. Back then, televisions were the size of a chest of drawers and music players could be the size of a child’s bed – hardly the kind of kit which required a travel-friendly plug.
Now, of course, our technological world is much more portable, and the plug’s prongs are capable of causing all manner of scratches and scuffs to laptops and the like when carried around.