There were a couple of dots to connect after this new thing from Motley Fool

The pace of technology is even faster than he expected.

Masayoshi Son Fortune

For one, he has a 300-year view of SoftBank’s growth strategy. He says that artificial intelligence combined with data gathered by billions of sensors will bring on an “information revolution,” that will benefit people more than the 19th century Industrial Revolution. 

Business Insider

In June 2010, the richest man in Japan revealed his latest vision for the next 30 years and the next 300 years.

Masayoshi Son, the chairman and CEO of tech behemoth SoftBank, shared his sci-fi predictions in a presentation at what was then SoftBank's 30th annual general meeting. We first saw the slide deck via Fortune.

Fast-forward seven years and Son has a tech fund close to $100 billion (£76 billion) at his disposal — thanks to companies like Appleand the Sovereign Wealth Fund of Saudi Arabia.

He's investing the money at a rapid pace into ideas that he hopes will turn his predictions — telepathy, superintelligent machines, computer-brain interfaces, and cloned sheep — into a reality.

Japanese Billionaire’s Prediction Will Give You GoosebumpsMotley Fool

Microsoft Gaming Plans

Anyone can make their own Hololens, games going platform agnostic. There's a broad and interesting strategy being implemented at Microsoft.

It will be nice to hold shares in the company that produces the best AR display.




Motley Fool

Nadella changed that by accelerating efforts to bring the best versions of all the company's products to any platform that wanted them. Ballmer should get credit for starting that process by bringing the Office apps to Android, but it was Nadella who has preached an any-device, any-customer strategy.

Project xCloud would do that for gaming, bringing the company's software (i.e., games) to people using tablets, phones, PCs, and who knows what other devices. Using Microsoft's Azure cloud platform, the company hopes to make streaming gaming available on 4G and eventually 5G networks. It laid out its broad goals in a blog post Choudhry made back in October:

Scaling and building out Project xCloud is a multi-year journey for us. We'll begin public trials in 2019 so we can learn and scale with different volumes and locations. Our focus is on delivering an amazing added experience to existing Xbox players and on empowering developers to scale to hundreds of millions of new players across devices. Our goal with Project xCloud is to deliver a quality experience for all gamers on all devices that's consistent with the speed and high-fidelity gamers experience and expect on their PCs and consoles.

Apples biggest manufacturer becomes its top rival

On the Motley Fool.... I suspect it's only a matter of time before the Fool talks about a cool new smartphone feature for smartphones from Foxconn/Sharp.

Foxconn’s Sharp overtakes Sony as the country’s second largest smartphone maker.

Leo Sun
(TMFSunLion)
Feb 20, 2019 at 6:30PM

Foxconn (NASDAQOTH:HNHAF), the Taiwanese contract manufacturing giant that makes Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhones, has transformed its Sharp subsidiary into Apple's biggest rival in Japan over the past three years. Research firm Canalys claims that Sharp controlled 9.8% of Japan's smartphone market in the fourth quarter of 2018, putting it in second place after Apple's 56% share.

Apple still holds a commanding lead, but Sharp's growth -- which helped it surpass Sony's (NYSE: SNE) 8.6% share during the fourth quarter -- could be a worrisome development for the iPhone maker. Is Foxconn quietly evolving from a longtime partner into a formidable rival?

What is Foxconn's strategy?

Foxconn, which has manufactured every iPhone to date, generates nearly half of its revenue from Apple. Therefore, slowing sales of iPhones are a major threat to its core business. To reduce its dependence on Apple and other contract manufacturing clients, Foxconn acquired Sharp in 2016 and revived the struggling consumer electronics brand by launching new OLED TVs and smartphones.

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So why is Sharp gaining ground in Japan?

In the past, smartphone makers in Japan benefited from aggressive subsidies and carrier promotions. This made premium handsets like iPhones cheaper and more appealing. However, Japanese regulators now want carriers to stop subsidizing device sales with monthly subscriptions in a bid to simplify contracts and promote fair competition.

This means that the cost of iPhones, which are already at historic highs, will keep rising and cause Japanese consumers to either shun upgrades or buy cheaper devices from lower-end device makers like Sharp. However, Canalys also expects Sharp to struggle with the elimination of subsidies, which made its cheap devices even cheaper.

Motley Fool... pay attention to Smart Speaker Market. -- UPDATED

In the right place at the right time, finally.

Google Smart Screen Walkthrough



Motley Fool

Keep an eye on this space

These tech giants' next big market focus is the home, and we're still in the early stages of this gold rush. Right now, Amazon still has a slight advantage because it was an early mover with its Echo devices, and its smart speakers remain an easy and natural way for consumers to buy products from its website.

Google is gaining ground with its Home and its Nest devices, but Facebook's Portal could hit a roadblock, given that users may have had their fill of Facebook-related privacy fiascos.

This market will be worth $138 billion by 2026, but the bigger opportunity for each of these companies is to lock users into their ecosystems, and then sell more ads or, in Amazon's case, more products.

It's clear that all three companies are looking to connected home devices to help them increase their interactions with users -- and if they do that successfully, it'll lead to more sales across their businesses.

CE PRO   --- Historic Period of Growth for Smart Homes

New Technology Led by Displays

“I have been in CE for 30 years and there is nothing more exciting than the smart home. There has never been a category that I was so skeptical about that I am now so bullish about,” commented Baker.  “Smart home is great but when all these other products are connected, it is even more exciting.”

While some integrators have soured on selling displays due to the lack of margin, Baker noted that display technology will continue to evolve and presents a strong opportunity for integrators.“The TV is not going to sit in the family room and not be connected to a bunch of other devices. It is just not going to happen,” he said, citing health and wellness is a great example of connectivity to the displays.

He specifically believes Amazon will make a big push into display connectivity because it does not have a cell phone play.

Baker believes the changing form factors of TVs – rollables, transparent and high design – will be a big new trend led by MicroLED, OLED and 5G TVs that direct stream signals (he dubs that category as Devices as a Services (DaaS))

*********************

The growth is primarily going to be driven by online spending. He noted that 6 percent of consumers are spending 75 percent of their disposable income online, but  40 percent of consumers still spend less than 10 percent of their disposable income online

“Online has not peaked at all. There are huge dollars coming,” he noted. “We are headed into a historic period of growth. We are at cusp on awesome new products.”

This stock could be like...

I occasionally will sit through some of the Motley Fool's video presentations. Even though I find them to be tedious, and a method of spending 20 minutes on what could take about 15 seconds.

One day -- after we've done quite well, they'll do one about MicroVision. 

I predict one of these about MVIS by the Fool Mid next year.

Still things happening, been busy.

19 Trillion opportunity?

When you connect to the internet of things, then you need displays. How do you get a good display (that data) into a small package? Tiny little laser projectors.

It's only a matter of time before Microvision is included in this collection of companies.

Hosting Article (More here)

Mobile to replace gaming consoles.

But mobile players are still going to want a big screen experience.


Death of the Gaming Console?  From the Motley Fool -- a Lot more at the source.

Consoles are still thriving, but the big growth is in mobile
Nintendo's plan to launch a new gaming platform in March 2017 and AMD's recent announcement that it will supply chips in three upcoming consoles virtually confirms that gaming hardware will see a historically quick refresh. Doubting the viability of consoles as sales are at a high point and more hardware releases are peaking over the horizon might seem odd, but shorter lifecycles for gaming systems point to pressure from mobile competition -- with more frequent hardware updates now potentially necessary to maintain a significant capability gap between consoles and mobile devices.

Mobile gaming looks to account for the mainstay of growth in coming years and is set to overtake console and PC revenues this year. Publishers including Electronic Arts and Activision Blizzard stand to benefit by growing their customer bases outside consoles. 

In addition to its movie and image-sensor business, video games are a core pillar in Sony's turnaround effort, which CEO Kazuo Hirai indicated was past the halfway point as of October 2015. The PlayStation 4 has thus far outperformed even optimistic targets before its release, and the platform's incredible momentum makes it likely that its upgraded sibling will be a win for Sony -- at least in the short term.

Motley Fool - Sony Future Lab Devices

This table top projector was displayed at CES with MicroVision -- They missed the Sony Agent (Which I think is closer to reality that some of the stuff they talk about here.)


Motley Fool -- More at the source.

AR tabletop projectors

Sony also showcased a projector that turns a tabletop into a touchscreen while beaming depth-sensitive digital objects onto the surface. It can also recognize and interact with physical objects. In a SXSW demo described by Engadget's Nathan Ingraham, the projector made the illustrations in a physical copy of Alice in Wonderland "jump" off the book and onto the table.

This is similar to Microsoft's (NASDAQ:MSFT) approach with HoloLens, except Sony's strategy doesn't require a headset and the images aren't three-dimensional. Microsoft has also dabbled in tabletop touchscreens before -- the "original" Surface, which was launched in 2007, was a 30" tabletop touchscreen. That device, which was later renamed PixelSense, was mainly sold to restaurants, hotels, and casinos. Microsoft also previously showcased "RoomAlive" projectors which turn rooms into interactive games, and "IllumiRoom" tech which projects images around the TV to blur the lines between the screen and the room.

It's unclear how Sony's AR projectors will be used, but they might eventually be marketed as a cheaper alternative to the HoloLens, or spice up its Home, Entertainment, and Sound business, which generated 16% of its sales last quarter.

Verizon Eyeing Millennial Media? & A Motley Fool lesson

So, the Motley Fool is all over delivering video and advertising through mobile networks -- with a focus on Verizon.

This should be very interesting to holders of $MVIS. Motley Fool often makes good calls about large trends. It's also very influential in getting people into stocks (CHECK MM since article below was released) And they're VERY close to discovering MicroVision -- it won't take much.

What this says about the ecosystem for PicoP is also amazing. Verizon is into Mobile video for advertising -- and they're clearly working hard on it. They purchased AOL for its ability to deliver video advertising.

Verizon is also the SONY carrier in the US.

If video advertising is a strong suit for Verizon, Verizon will be able to subsidize the cost of PicoP (the delivery) and the content to consumers. Making mobile video consumption that much more popular. 

When the Fax machine arrived on the market it was a hard sell. The idea was interesting, but your Fax machine wasn't any good unless someone else had one too. This is a further illustration that PicoP will arrive into an ecosystem that is already demanding it. PicoP will help sell the other services Verizon wants to sell -- like subscriptions to watch NFL football, and advertising as well.

We're almost there.

Millennial Media Website

From Fortune

While AOL may be most known for its dial-up services and growing content empire —which includes The Huffington Post, Engadget and TechCrunch—it also has put together a sophisticated suite of advertising technologies for online and traditional media that no other company (aside from Google and Facebook) can match. AOL’s platform is particularly strong in video advertising—which CommScore says reaches more than 50% of the U.S. population. The Internet company’s successful digital platform will also coincidentally assist Verizon’s plans to launch its own Internet TV service, which it announced this year after buying Intel’s media assets in 2014 and video delivery network EdgeCast in 2013.

From MotleyFool

Why would Verizon buy Millennial?
To understand why Verizon might buy Millennial, we should discuss its growing interest in advertising. 

...upcoming streaming TV service. Verizon already has experience delivering video -- its FiOS TV service reaches over five million U.S. households, and it partnered with the NFL to let users stream games to their mobile devices.

What Millennial brings to the table
In a nutshell, Verizon now owns several small advertising businesses which aren't fully integrated with each other. That's where Millennial Media comes in -- its network reaches over 670 million unique users monthly, and it has the potential to deliver ads to over 65,000 apps.

... but it's Millennial's ability to deliver ads into apps through an automated, real-time exchange which makes it a tempting purchase. If Verizon can bundle AOL One and Millennial's programmatic platforms together, it can offer advertisers all-in-one plans for advertising across mobile apps, PC screens, and TVs. If Verizon then blends data from its wireless customers, AOL, and Millennial into a single database, it could craft powerful targeted ads like Facebook and Google.

Motley Fool & Augmented Reality

This is a repeat article. Good. Makes me curious when the next article about the topic with new information will hit the press.

Augmented reality is probably going to get mass adoption far faster than we think.

When MVIS gets the attention of Motley Fool, interesting things will start to happen.

I suspect they've seen the chart of Augmented Reality Patents and Augmented and Head Mounted Patents

Apple acquires Metaio (for augmented Reality Patents)

From Motley Fool

The Foolish bottom lineAt the end of the day, we ask ourselves, how can virtual reality add value?

• In the entertainment industry, content is key. Virtual reality offers studios the ability to create better content and have access to wider distribution -- boosting sales of games, movies, or tickets.
• In the corporate world, efficiency is key. More cost-effective communication tools could save on SG&A, but still preserve the meeting-room feel.
• In advertising, data is key. Augmented reality could make life easier for consumers or skilled workers, but also provide feedback on their habits or needs.

We think the adoption of virtual reality can have a big impact on many industries all over the world(s).

Hype? 

The potential for practical application AND entertainment is huge.

Smart helmet on Bloomberg

From MyBroadband

The way we consume information: Imagine going to a library or museum and being able to have a “conversation” with key people throughout history, or instantly transform the world around to you resemble a bygone era.

The fields of product development, marketing and customer engagement: Overlaying new digital services into retail environments opens up a host of new possibilities for organisations to tailor products to their consumers.

Back office/operational functions within the organisation: Companies are already finding ways to use AR in their supply chain, logistics and warehousing environments. Find out, for example, if a particular unit is missing from a shelf.

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeny at Gamespresso

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney claimed that Virtual Reality is just a niche concept for casual gamers in a recent interview with GamesIndustry. He also went on to state that Augmented Reality will become the next big thing in the developing realm.

“Whereas AR, if you look out a number of years I bet the majority of mankind will have an AR device – it will redefine interaction with computers and replace computer monitors, tablets, televisions and every kind of play technology.” While AR may be a view years out, it’s exciting to think about the endless ways AR could be incorporated not into just video games, but into daily life as well.

Sweeney promises more news within the year and we can only hope to apart of the Augmented Reality Generation.

With computing sticks -- PicoPro can be a complete PC.

With Celluon's PicoPro, MicroVision can ALREADY help you keep a complete PC with a large screen display -- in your POCKET.

MotleyFool

5 Gadgets under $100 that will blow your mind.

This Timing Power RK3188 Android Mini PC combines deceptive power with sleek style. Image source: Timing Power.


Daniel B. Kline (Computing sticks):Improving technology has redefined the definition of portability when it comes to computers. Portable used to mean laptops (and way back in the day, lugging around the early Apple Macs). Now, portable encompasses form factors ranging widely from tablets to hybrids to other tweener devices. The most interesting of these, however, might be the computing sticks

Under $100 gets you a full-powered computer the size of a fat flash memory stick. To stay within a $100 budget, you'll have to settle for a stick running Google (NASDAQ: GOOG ) (NASDAQ: GOOGL ) Chrome OS or Android; those running Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT ) Windows cost closer to $200. For that price, however, you'll get a mini-computer that fits in your pocket. Simply plug it into a HDMI slot on a TV or computer monitor, add a keyboard and mouse, and you're good to go.

This has the potential to change the computing equation for travelers and businesspeople alike. It also lowers the price point for full-powered computing devices to the point at which a computer with a familiar Chrome or Android interface is affordable to a much larger population. Computing sticks are not Raspberry Pi cheap, but they are accessible and should be popular specifically among people whose first connected device is an Android phone.

TimingPowerCompany

Remember Fire TV?

The headline reads:

Now, if you've been onboard and following MicroVision for a while, you'll remember something key. If you're relatively new to following MicroVision, this will be new. Watch this video. (Odds are you haven't seen it, because -- look at the view count.)

The video below is projecting on the ceiling with a Kindle Fire tablet with an embedded PicoP projector. From the 2013 Annual Stockholder's Meeting. 




That will give some interesting context to the following snippets from an April 2, 2015 MotleyFool article: From Motley Fool


The headline reads: 

Amazon Fire TV Just took a huge shot at AppleTV and Chromecast.

Road warriors rejoiceFirst, Amazon added public Wi-Fi compatibility to both Fire TV and Fire TV Stick. Translation? Fire TV will now work on those pesky hotel Wi-Fi connections that require a Web browser to sign in.

This might sound like a minor improvement, but it addresses a major complaint among a large group of media streaming connoisseurs who have so far been disappointed by the lack of options to seamlessly complete this task. For example, neither Google Chromecast nor Apple TV currently support public Wi-Fi by default. As a result, users of these devices have had to resort to cumbersome workarounds such as spoofing their MAC address or using a separate travel router to essentially trick such Wi-Fi connections into allowing their devices to connect.

Amazon Fire TV now supports external USB storage, Credit: Amazon.

External storageNext, Amazon Fire TV now supports the use of USB flash drives (up to 128GB) for additional storage of games and apps. This update doesn't extend to the smaller Fire TV Stick -- which is roughly the same size as a USB flash drive in the first place -- but it's still great for Fire TV users given the thousands of games and apps the platform has supported since its launch. Apple TV, for its part, has a USB port for service and support, while Chromecast has a size/hardware dilemma in this case that is similar to Fire TV Stick's.

From Motley Fool

Now, configure one of those for external storage, and public WiFi then throw in PicoP and you have a HUGE winner.