The Beam is the first mainstream phone to directly incorporate projector technology, which has become increasingly common on top-of-the range compact digital cameras cameras.

Photos and videos can be viewed on any flat service, and Samsung claims the 15-lumens projector is even useful outdoors.

So-called pico projectors have long been slightly too big to incorporate into mobile phones. At 12.5mm thick the Beam is slightly larger than other models, which are sometimes under 8mm, but well within the range existing phone consumers routinely purchase.

It features a 5MP camera, and runs Google’s Android 2.3 software on a 1.0GHz dual-core processor. The projector is run through a dedicated application, and the phone features a large 2000mAh to cope with some of the extra demand.

The Beam announcement was one of the first to be made at the Mobile World Congress show in Barcelona, where the largest phone companies demonstrate their forthcoming products. Samsung has already announced that its widely anticipated follow-up to the popular Galaxy SII smartphone will, however, be announced at a separate even later in the year.