augmented reality
Apple said to be working a high-priced standalone VR headset as debut mixed reality product
Apple is reportedly working on developing a high-end virtual reality headset for a potential sales debut in 2022, per a new Bloomberg report. The headset would include its own built-in…
Vuzix’s new microLED-powered smart glasses will arrive this summer
Less than a full day into CES 2021, and it seems that smart glasses are very much shaping up as a trend. I wrote about a pair of AR glasses…
Lenovo seems to have gotten the memo that the real money in the augmented reality space is going to be made in enterprise. Ahead of tomorrow’s CES kick off, the…
Pokémon GO creator Niantic has acquired a small SF gaming startup building a league and tournament organization platform to help gamers create their own communities around popular titles. Mayhem was…
The New York Times is bringing its signature crosswords game into augmented reality. The media company announced this morning it’s launching a new AR-enabled game, “Shattered Crosswords,” on Instagram, where…
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Despite limitations, 3D and AR are creating new realities in retail
“Within the next five years, I think we’re going to see that having AR and 3D on your dot-com and beyond will be mandatory.”
Snap announces $3.5M fund directed toward AR Lens creation
Snap today announced a new 2021 fund of $3.5 million that will be directed toward supporting Snapchat Lens creators and developers who are using the company’s Lens Studio tool to…
When Chi Xu left Magic Leap and returned to China, he had big ambitions. He believed China would have its own augmented and virtual reality giants, just as how the…
Google now lets anyone contribute to Street View using AR and an app
An update to Google’s Street View app on Android will now let anyone contribute their photos to help enhance Google Maps, the company announced this morning. Using a “connected photos”…
Jio Platforms, the biggest telecom operator in India and which has raised over $20 billion from Facebook, Google and other high-profile investors this year, is leading a financing round of…
Google has teamed up with Disney and Lucasfilm to bring the Star Wars streaming series “The Mandalorian” to augmented reality. The company announced this morning the launch of a new…
Tech companies around the world are still identifying the “next big thing” enabled by 5G connections. Some, such as Oppo, are betting it will be augmented reality. The Chinese smartphone…
To own an AR future, Niantic wants to build a smarter map of the world
Niantic is continuing to bet heavily on the idea that it knows where consumer computing is headed, namely toward augmented reality. The game development startup behind Pokémon GO has some…
There’s an AR ghost on Google Search. There’s a dancing skeleton, set of creepy jack-o’-lanterns, and costumed cats and dogs, too. Ahead of Halloween weekend in the U.S., Google has…
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7 investors discuss augmented reality and VR startup opportunities in 2020
For all of the investors preaching that augmented reality technology will likely be the successor to the modern smartphone, today, most venture capitalists are still quite wary to back AR plays. The reasons are plentiful, but all tend to circle around the idea that it’s too early for software and too expensive to try to…
Vectary, a design platform for 3D and AR, raises $7.3M from EQT and BlueYard
Vectary, a design platform for 3D and augmented reality (AR), has raised a $7.3 million round led by European fund EQT Ventures. Existing investor BlueYard (Berlin) also participated. Vectary makes…
Snapchat among first to leverage iPhone 12 Pro’s LiDAR Scanner for AR
Apple introduced its latest flagship iPhone models, the iPhone 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max, at its iPhone event on Tuesday. Among other things, the devices sport a new LiDAR…
Envisics nabs $50M for its in-car holographic display tech at a $250M+ valuation
The jury is still out on what might become the most viable business models for augmented reality technology, but in the meantime a startup out of the U.K. is betting…
Daydream, Google’s mobile-focused virtual reality platform, is losing official support from Google, Android Police reports. The company confirmed that it will no longer be updating the Daydream software, with the…
Google today announced a few updates to Live View, the augmented reality walking directions in its Google Maps app that officially launched last year. Live View uses your phone’s camera…
Facebook is launching smart glasses in 2021, its ‘next step’ to an AR device
At Facebook’s first big event since moving away from the Oculus brand and rebranding its AR and VR efforts as “Facebook Reality Labs,” it announced a new consumer wearable and…
Immersive chat startups have a very different vision for the future of voice
What happens when startups look to build on the trendiness of podcasting and social audio platforms while injecting them with some of virtual reality’s weirdness? Turns out, plenty of founders…
Google acquires smart glasses company North, whose Focals 2.0 won’t ship
Google confirmed today via blog post that it has acquired Canadian smart glasses company North, which began life as human interface hardware startup Thalmic Labs in 2012. The company didn’t…
Etsy adds an AR shopping feature on iOS designed for use with wall art
Retailers like Target, Home Depot, Wayfair, IKEA, and others have embraced augmented reality to help shoppers make decisions about products they’re interested in by visualizing the items in their own…
Setting expectations has been one area where Snap has — to date — seemed to fare better than its competitors.
Magic Leap talked a big game, and few were more responsible for fostering a cult of hype and excitement around its vision of the future than the company’s founder and…
Sketchfab launches team platform to share and collaborate on 3D models
Sketchfab is enabling multiplayer mode today with a new Sketchfab for Teams feature. The startup lets you share 3D models with other people in your company so that they can…
Magic Leap’s $2.6 billion bait and switch
Intended or not — I assume it wasn’t — Magic Leap became a $2.6 billion bait-and-switch, the consequences of which are now all too apparent.
While some U.S. investors might have taken comfort from China’s rebound, we still find ourselves in the early innings of this period of uncertainty.
Since first uploading a YouTube teaser video of its tech five years ago, Magic Leap’s presence in the augmented reality industry has been controversial. Some have lauded the team’s ambitions,…