LEHI, Utah — Most of us know what it’s like to crack our cell phone screen.
According to uBreakiFix, an American chain of electronic repair shops, two smartphone screens crack every second in the United States.
However, BodyGuardz, which is part of BGZ brands in Lehi, has cranked out a new, .288 millimeter thick screen protector called Apex to guard these devices against all types of damage.
Jordan Melville, the company’s senior director of product, said it took them almost three, trial-and-error-filled years to create the screen protector that starts as a mixture of sea sand and broken glass.
He explains how they’re able to change the product during the manufacturing process on a molecular level once the mixture is heated in an industrial oven and cured.
“We’re making the crystal structure so dense that even a single point doesn’t break the screen protector,” Melville explained.
To prove his point, Melville demonstrated the screen protector’s strength using what’s called a ball drop machine. He said most products currently on the market can withstand a 64-gram ball being dropped from about four feet. However, Apex can withstand a 130-gram ball being dropped from more than six feet.
FOX13 News watched as the weighted ball actually bounced off their screen protector, leaving no cracks behind.
This innovation is a big change from where BGZ brands started, according to Kirk Feller, the company’s President and CEO.
“We found these students out at BYU who were selling these little screen protectors out of their home. They were cutting them in their garage,” Feller said, who is also a BYU alum.
He said once they took over the business in 2002, they were making screen protectors out of plastic, but a major shift occurred five years later when Apple released its original iPhone which had a glass screen.
“It was completely different. Now we were interacting with the phone on a whole new level,” explained Feller.
By 2012, Feller said they were the first to introduce tempered glass screen protection in the U.S., and they’ve always been interested in how they can make the product better.
That mission continues to this day as they continually strive to provide cutting-edge and sustainable technology to consumers while adapting to the rapidly evolving industry.
