It is safe to say that Samsung is not sitting on its laurels when it comes to innovative form factors. The company already has two foldable phones, the Galaxy Z Fold 2, which opens up to become a large tablet, and the Galaxy Z Flip, which folds in half to become a compact device. And now the company has confirmed that it will experiment with a more unorthodox way of cramming more display into a smaller space.

According to Korean website The Elec, Samsung Display has made a public statement about its plans in the "rollable and sliding" arena. The company's senior vice president, Choi Gwon Young, said during a fourth-quarter conference call that Samsung Display will promote "small to medium-sized displays this year."

There are two important things to note here. First, the report does not define what it means by rollable or sliding. Perhaps it refers to the way the screen unfolds (scroll-like or sliding), but one would imagine that the results would be quite similar for the average consumer.

Second, and perhaps more importantly, note that the report refers specifically to Samsung displays. It is possible that the company's experiments with rollable/sliding displays may be limited to TV sets that are not small enough to fit in a pocket.

It is also possible that the company is talking about manufacturing displays for use by other companies, but given Samsung's eagerness to be the first to get out of the trap with a foldable handset, that seems unlikely on the cell phone front.

With all of these caveats covered, there is good reason to believe that Samsung is working on a foldable handset: not only has LG's (presumably abandoned) rollable handset piqued media interest, but a recently discovered patent indicates that Samsung has been working on a foldable display for at least a year. indicating that it had been considering the practicality of a rollable display.

In the unlikely event that neither LG nor Samsung offered a rollable phone, not all hope is lost; TCL is also developing a rollable design and demonstrated it at CES. No release date was given, but LG's option is reported to cost $2,359 (again, assuming it arrives), so TCL's reputation for low-cost devices may prove attractive to those on a budget.