Lucid made it official that its software is inside the highly anticipated Samsung Galaxy S5. This comes as great news for the company that is well known for GPU virtualization, but in recent years Lucid is going after the mobile market.  Winning the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and Note 10.1 was a great success for the company, but the Galaxy S5 is likely to be the best selling phone in the Android ecosystem and Lucidlogix will have a piece of the pie.

Lucid claims that it can increase the product power efficiency up to 35 percent extending the time before you need to recharge your phone and plug it in the wall again. Since battery life is a big issue for just about every smartphone out there, a 35 percent improvement is a big deal.

Lucid has announced that its GameXtend software is shipping inside around 10 million devices and of course with Galaxy S5 this number will increase rather quickly. Lucid claims that in popular 2D or 3D games it can increase the playing time as much as two to three hours, or up to 35 percent, which is a huge difference.

Samsung’s Hyung-Moon No, Vice President of Technology Alliance Group, Samsung Electronics IT & Mobile Division said: “Today’s mobile devices are all about power, speed and efficiency,” “With GameXtend integrated into our Galaxy S5, we are committed to deliver a truly superior mobile user experience.”

GameXtend is a piece of software integrated in Samsung’s ROM and it is basically a set of patent pending state-of-the-art algorithms designed to reduce power draw in real time to extend play time and reduce app interruptions. Part of the GameXtend magic is to mitigate other typical battery management functions, such as screen brightness and voltage utilization, which, as a result, keeps the device cool and comfortable.

We saw WebExtend and NavExtend demos at CES 2014 and Mobile World Congress 2014. We can only hope that these two pieces of software can make it into future devices such as Galaxy S5. Imagine being able to run your navigation up to 35 percent longer. If you ever used a phone-based satnav system, including Google Maps, you are aware how fast navigation can drain your battery. The GPS works all the time, the SoC has to process information and render everything in real time on a power hungry screen.

Driving in California and missing the Cupertino off-ramp when the navigation drains your battery quicker than ever is definitely not a funny experience for a European driver. This is why NavExtend and optimization of this power hungry task makes perfect sense.

Also read:

Samsung Galaxy S5 has Lucid Xtend

Galaxy Note 3 NavExtend in action