The One Touch and The Circle
Bluetooth Earphones
2007 for Seneka, Inc.
Seneka, Inc. was a small startup company specializing in IT software and electronics engineering development.
They were ambitious to develop their own branded consumer product to advance their business and focused on the increasing demand for Bluetooth earphones, driven by the high supply of mobile phones in South Korea in 2007. Based on this trend, they aimed to develop a Bluetooth earphone leveraging one of their existing capabilities with low risk.
What will be the Most Impactful Improvement for the Bluetooth Earphones?
For Seneka, it was important to develop their first-ever, self-branded Bluetooth earphone with intuitively impactful improvements—whether aesthetic, functional, or usability-related—to capture consumers’ attention, as the market is already saturated with Bluetooth earphones.
To achieve this goal, identifying the most impactful areas for improvement was the main challenge of the project, and the design development was carried out with this focus.
Simply Touch it Instead of Pushing it!
While exploring design concepts, I focused on the general use cases of Bluetooth earphones. Typically, users cannot see their earphones while wearing them, making it difficult to locate and operate physical buttons. This issue is especially problematic for delivery workers, who frequently use Bluetooth earphones and need to activate or deactivate them often.
The One Touch was designed to address this usability challenge. Its entire front surface functions as a capacitive touch activation button, allowing users to activate or deactivate it simply by touching anywhere on the front. This was a completely new usability approach in the Bluetooth earphone category, solving a real problem and offering a dramatically improved user experience.
In addition, its minimal yet sleek overall aesthetic, paired with a high-gloss surface finish, makes it appealing as a stylish wearable device.
The Circle was designed by reusing the internal components of The One Touch, except for the capacitive touch activation. Seneka aimed to develop it as a lower-cost version using a traditional tactile activation button. However, its large circular button with a chamfered surface detail helps users easily locate it.
Both The One Touch and The Circle offer a new Bluetooth earphone experience, combining significantly improved usability with a minimal, sleek design—refined as modern wearables.
*Both The One Touch and The Circle was sold only in South Korea, and Seneka Inc. closed its business in 2012.
Design Team: Joongoo Lee (Industrial Design Lead / Project Manager)
Design Credit: Seneka, Inc. Suwon. South Korea. / Joongoo Lee