It’s happening even quicker than we imagined!
As of 2020, the pace of growth of AR/VR has surpassed expectations.
Thanks to the big giants like Apple, Google, Facebook and many others who are making the world of AR/VR capable.
The giants have big chunk investments in R&D as they race to develop what shall be the next major computing platform.
This is the reason we see a major leap in the market size of AR/VR from 6.1 billion USD to 19 billion USD as of this writing.
This is expected to be at 31 billion USD by 2023.
Diverse strategies
The large tech companies are scripting their own strategies for deploying AR/VR. Some are developing hardware like headsets, PCs and graphics cards which enable these technologies to run and some are developing platforms, softwares that run on smartphones and headsets. As in any other industry these two strategies complement each other and grow hand in hand contributing to widespread adoption.
Good symptoms
The investments in recent times made by big companies is only a hint at the value, gathering on the AR/VR market. Let us take a look at some important events in the past below:
Facebook : “It started with Facebook spending two billion dollars on a startup called Oculus that didn’t even have a product yet..“ They only had some prototypes. Today FB has successfully created an AR/VR ecosystem with its low cost headsets, application store and a slew of games and applications at affordable prices.
Google : After Google announced its own set of AR/VR technologies, it has developed ARcore for Android. This framework enables developers to create AR applications for Android smartphones, which still dominate the market in volume. Google has also invested big in the company Magic Leap. Magic Leap, with its announcement of a mixed reality headset and computing device, was valued at about 2 billion USD, even before their commercial launch.
Microsoft : Microsoft spent a decade and over a billion USD on the ‘next thing in AR’ which happened to be Hololens. It is the device which serves its best use in the enterprise market.
HTC : HTC is the biggest competitor to the Oculus. As an early participant, HTC has contributed big in the AR/VR space. HTC vive headsets is one of the leading VR headsets in the space and also has focussed on the platform as a whole. The company focus has largely shifted to VR from the smartphone market in recent times.
Apple : Apple launched ARKit which allows your iPhones and iPads to be AR capable. Overnight Apple became the largest AR platform in the world. ARKit will allow developers to utilize the camera, CPU, GPU, and motion sensors of the devices to achieve near real-time motion tracking that locates planar surfaces, like floors or tables, and display 3D interactive virtual objects that overlay the physical world. Recently reports suggest that the company has been working on a VR headset to be launched in 2022.
Sony : With sony launching the Playstation VR in 2016, it took advantage of its unshakable presence in the gaming market. With critics appreciating the product design and its ease of use, Sony sold over 5 million units as of 2021.
Competition in the VR computation hardware market
Any design and research activity to do with VR comes with intense computing requirements.
Intel and AMD are developing workstation processors which makes AR/VR technologies run smoothly.
Recent i7 and i9 processors and AMD’s Ryzen processors are being tested on AR/VR systems to make them compatible.
NVIDIA has a lion’s share in graphics cards with RTX and QUADRO type which enable AR/VR tech to run smoothly with Intel and AMD processors. In fact there are specific VR Ready laptops and desktops specifically designed and tested for VR.
Qualcomm produces XR chipsets aimed at powering the next generation headsets that will get lighter and powerful.
With the vast majority of the industry focusing on the immersive media segment, now is the right time to adopt the new technologies to further your business growth.
Contact Rayvector on how you can utilize these amazing tech to innovate your business ground up.
