This week, Next Reality published profiles on the leaders in augmented reality hardware industry, with Magic Leap CEO Rony Abovitz topping the list. So, it should be no surprise that two app makers want to align themselves with Magic Leap's flagship product.
Augmented reality gaming developer Niantic has decided to give its players the opportunity to make their mark on Pokémon GO with a PokéStop nomination system.
After a $20 million funding round fell through, augmented reality headset maker Meta Company has been forced to furlough (or place on temporary leave of absence) approximately 65% of its workforce for 30 days.
Better known among consumers for its virtual reality apps, Jaunt is now pivoting toward solutions for augmented reality developers.
The display is one of the most critical components in augmented reality hardware, and on Tuesday, one of the companies making that component, Avegant Corp., closed a funding round of $12 million to support development of next-generation AR displays.
Computer vision company Blippar has already dabbled with outdoor AR navigation, but now it wants to make it easier for people to make their way through indoor spaces with augmented reality.
The arrival of Magic Leap One is tantalizingly close and, although the company has been saving the last details for launch day, a few of the more important details were found this week hiding deep in the code on Magic Leap's website.
For years, Magic Leap has promised to deliver stunning augmented reality experiences that will outperform any other competitor, and a newly revealed partnership hints that the company may be able to deliver on those promises.
Germany-based Augmented reality software maker Re'flekt has added a new tool to its enterprise app development platform that makes it simpler to link AR content to physical objects.
Despite the fact that Snap Inc.'s Spectacles weren't the hit some were expecting, the company is nevertheless taking another swing at it by releasing an updated version.
Although Magic Leap's founder Rony Abovitz has a lot to say about his product, what people really want are visuals, and it looks like we're about to get a lot more of those in the coming weeks. In a post on Magic Leap's official announcements forum page, the company revealed that it plans to begin a monthly livestream series on Twitch.
This week's Game Developers Conference came at just the right time for Magic Leap, a company that was riding a wave of bad news from legal troubles and rumors regarding Magic Leap One.
Noted poet T.S. Elliot once wrote that "April is the cruelest month." But Magic Leap might argue that March is the most miserable, as the Ides of March brought more legal woes to augmented reality startup. Elsewhere, its closely-held branding secrets have been spilled by way of the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
All the cash Magic Leap is amassing is probably going a long way toward hardware development and manufacturing, but it's also becoming increasingly clear that a large portion of that cash will be devoted to content. The latest proof is a new partnership between Magic Leap and the UK's Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC).
On Monday, German newspaper and digital publisher Axel Springer announced its role as the latest company to invest in Magic Leap. This is just the latest in a series of investments the augmented reality company has garnered from the likes of Google, Qualcomm, Alibaba, Legendary Entertainment, Warner Bros., and others amounting to almost $2 billion in overall funding.
After closing its 2017 financial books on a high note, Snap, Inc. is planning to ride the momentum of its augmented reality products into the new year. That's the main takeaway following the company's 2017 earnings conference call, which was held on Tuesday.
It looks like Magic Leap is getting its ducks in a row to launch its Magic Leap One: Creator Edition as the company's name is once again showing up in US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) filings.
Following up on a preview of the deal we reported during last week's CES, Dell has officially announced the details around its role as the first company to resell the Meta 2 augmented reality headset.
Using the CES tech conference in Las Vegas as the launch pad, Dell has announced that it's partnering with Meta Company to offer its augmented reality headsets to business customers.
As the calendar year (and, for many companies, the fiscal year) comes to a close, it appears 2017 may stand as the new high-water mark for investment in augmented and virtual reality technology.
When it comes to making smartglasses that look more like regular eyeglasses and less like sci-fi helmets, Corning International might be among the suppliers to make it happen.
It finally happened. Magic Leap has given the world its first glimpse at its debut device, the Magic Leap One Creator Edition.
Last week, Magic Leap CEO Rony Abovitz teased his Twitter followers with some "fun and cool stuff" to share in the coming days. On Monday, he made good on that promise, sort of.
In a move that will increase production capacity for its TrueDepth camera system, Apple has awarded vendor Finisar with $390 million from its Advanced Manufacturing Fund.
The would-be role of Snap Inc. as the first step toward mainstreaming wearable tech in the form of glasses has stalled, and now we have proof. In the company's third quarter financial results report, released on Tuesday, Snap Inc. revealed that it will lose nearly $40 million due to unsold Spectacles, the camera glasses first sold at kiosks throughout the US.
When it comes to augmented reality smartglasses, for now, it's still a mostly enterprise world, since the form and function of most are more acceptable on a job site versus your local cafe, and the still high price tags are far more palatable to major companies rather than individuals.
At the Augmented World Expo Europe press conference in Munich today, RE'FLEKT will unveil the addition of remote video calling to their RE'FLEKT One enterprise augmented reality platform, in addition to ARKit and ARCore apps that demonstrate the platform's capabilities.
As expected, Magic Leap closed a Series D round of equity funding, raising $502 million from new and existing investors. Less expected, however, were a fresh set of rumors that the company's first devices could ship within six months.
Lowe's Home Improvement has been an early adopter of augmented and virtual reality in their business practices, so it was a bit of surprise that their name was absent from the ranks of companies launching ARKit apps last week.
Outside of early military applications, augmented reality is a relatively new technology. It stands to reason that the next company to make a splash in AR would be a startup, and Techstars wants to help.
While Meta Company has agreed to a settlement in its lawsuit against a former employee and his company, they find the tables have now turned on them in the form of patent infringement allegations from another entity.
BMW seeks to hire 2,000 engineers for its driverless program ahead of the launch of its iNext Level 3 model in 2021, a source close to the company told Driverless.
According The Venture Reality Fund, the introductions of Facebook's camera platform and Apple's ARKit catalyzed increased activity among companies developing consumer applications.
Augmented and virtual reality continues to be a hot commodity among tech investors, with more than $800 million invested in AR/VR companies in the second quarter alone and global tech leaders like Samsung focusing their investment strategies on the emerging field.
A new survey shows that the majority of companies have an interest in using augmented reality, though adoption remains low. Meanwhile, two companies with support roles in the augmented reality industry are seeing positive financial results.
Thanks to a $100 million deal, you could be seeing more original shows on your Snapchat soon. Already, Snap has been producing super short shows in order to compete with social media outlets like Twitter and Facebook who have also been attempting to create their own content. While musical.ly has so far had the biggest success in this area, this deal with Time Warner is certainly promising for the beleaguered platform.
Driverless partnerships continue to appear as Continental AG, leading German automotive manufacturing company, has signed a strategic cooperation agreement with global electric startup, NIO. The goal of this partnership is to research, share, and develop autonomous technology, among other developments.
Honda president Takahiro Hachigo has just announced that Honda will complete development of fully self-driving cars by 2025. While the company aims to have level 3 — or conditionally autonomous cars requiring human intervention only in emergencies — on the road in time for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, these level 4 cars would require no intervention in most environments and thus bring Honda one step closer to producing fully driverless cars.
The leading platforms enabling augmented reality technology lead our headlines in Market Reality this week.
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