There hasn't been any major eye-popping breakthrough in the smartphone industry since the first colored mobile phone screen and since mobile phones lost their keys.

Samsung is about to change that.

The Samsung Galaxy X, formerly known as Project Valley, will be the first ever foldable smartphone-slash-tablet. That is, if the company succeeds in moving past the concept and into actual production.

According to a report, Samsung recently applied for a patent involving a flip phone.

Now, flip phones are a known entity. They were popular in the '90s and '00s with the iconic Motorola Razr leading the way. Samsung will likely not go that route despite the clamor for the return of the Razr. The company is talking about a different kind of flipping.

The South Korean company is in the process of developing a device that, translated from Korean, "can be folded or unfolded semi-automatically".

The patent was filed early in the year with the Korea Intellectual Property Office. The document submitted contained illustrations of a "long and narrow Samsung handset with a flexible seam in the middle that allows it to be folded in on itself, much like a flip phone".

The concept behind the foldable phone dates back to 2011. Five years ago, the Korean tech giant released a prototype featuring a folding touch AMOLED display.

The prototype impressed despite its awkward appearance. It did not break even after 100,000 folds while the brightness at the center where the folding takes place only dropped by six percent.

Samsung recently offered an apology for the fiasco involving exploding phones and flying washer lids.

In the published ad, Samsung stressed that the company "has a long heritage of innovation" and is "always looking to innovate and create the next generation of great consumer technology".

The possible game-changing foldable phones may just be what Samsung needs to move forward.