San Francisco, Feb 18 (IANS): At a time when smartphone makers are thinking of bringing foldable devices, Guangdong-headquartered TCL Corporation is also making a phone with a slide out screen.

The device will feature an extendable screen that you can turn into a tablet.

"...TCL is working on a phone that has a slide-out display instead of one you can bend in half like the Galaxy Z Flip and Motorola Razr. The point? To give you as much screen space as a tablet without having to carry one around," CNET reported on Monday.

Based on images that CNET obtained, this concept phone looks like a standard phone, which then turns it into a tablet after you've pulled out the screen.

A working prototype of the phone was slated to debut next week, before concern for the coronavirus resulted in a cancelled Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2020.

According to reports, when viewed from the back, the extended portion of the TCL's phone would have its own (non glass) backing to support the display.

It looks like the right (extended) side is a hair slimmer than the left, so there's room to house the sliding portion of the device, the report added.