Fujitsu Laser Glasses

I must admit that I haven't found a direct connection between MicroVision and this Fujitsu project. However, retinal scan display, and "shooting lasers into the eye" displays are MicroVision's realm, so this is worth close attention.

At PC World

At CIO

At ITProPortal

The basic idea of projecting imagery onto a retina via laser has been around for decades, but miniaturizing the optics to realize a wearable form factor had been difficult until recently. Fujitsu and partner companies were able to produce a small mirror to project light into the eye.

“By using these glasses, people with low vision will be able to read books, newspapers, bulletin boards, timetables and walk around outside,” said Mitsuru Sugawara, CEO of QD Laser, a Fujitsu spinoff based in Kawasaki that helped develop the glasses.

Interesting new stuff headed for Verizon? UPDATED 5/13/2015

From PhoneArena

Verizon is seemingly getting ready to release several interesting devices, including the Sony Xperia Z4, two unannounced tablets from Apple and LG, and a new Desire from HTC. According to Evan Blass (aka @evleaks), all these devices are "coming to Verizon", though there's no word on exactly when they'll be released. 

We don't know if the Xperia Z4 that's headed to Verizon is similar to the Japanese version of the handset. Sony is supposedly preparing a global variant of the Z4, so we assume that's the one that will be sold by Verizon. 

As for the upcoming Verizon tablets that we mentioned above, these are, reportedly, the Apple iPad mini 4, and the LG G Pad X 8.3. Since the iPad mini 3 was announced in October 2014, we're not expecting the iPad mini 4 to be unveiled before October this year. We don't know anything about the LG G Pad X 8.3, but this is likely the successor to the LG G Pad 8.3 from 2013 (which Verizon is currently selling for $129.99 on contract). 

Another Article found later: TechTimes  

"Serial leaker @evleaks took a break from his quiet life of retirement to announce that Verizon will be carrying four interesting new devices, two of which remain unannounced."

From The Boston Globe

Gadgets for the Geared Up Traveler @ Boston Globe

Bring a big screen on your adventures

Turn your hotel room, campground, or vacation cabin into a theater space with Celluon’s new PicoPro, a high-definition laser pico projector.The super-portable device weighs less than 7 ounces, measures a little larger than a Samsung Galaxy S5, and sets up without any fuss.

It produces a stunning display up to about 21-feet wide for a big-screen viewing experience.

The projector’s most endearing feature: It stays in focus all the time, so no fiddling with focus dials or buttons. 

The PicoPro connects to your iOS device, laptop, or TV by HDMI cable or wirelessly to Miracast-enabled Android devices. Plug an external speaker into the 3.5mm audio jack for a sound boost. The PicoPro has a battery life of up to 3.5 hours, and comes with a handy little adjustable stand.

$379.99. 800-399-5260, www.celluon.com

Sony Products SO good...

SONY can't keep up with demand for smartphone cameras.

This is GOOD news.

First, our partner has a lot of demand for its products. This tells us that they will keep making money. This is good.

They are also having this difficulty keeping up with demand because their product was so good, at such a good price, it represented a great value for the OEMS and they all demanded more.

I firmly believe we can expect similar quality and demand for SONY projector engines with PicoP technology.


"Sony is having a lot of trouble keeping up with demand for its Exmor IMX214 camera sensor, which is currently the part of choice for Chinese smartphone makers. "

@ Fudzilla

At the Market Offering --- UPDATED

Announcement of ATM agreement

"MicroVision, Inc. (MVIS), a leader in innovative ultra-miniature projection display and imaging technology, today announced it entered into a $6 million At-the-Market (ATM) equity offering agreement with Meyers Associates, L.P. (doing business as BP Capital, a division of Meyers Associates, L.P.), or BP Capital, on May 5, 2015."


There's a lot of worry today over the company doing an ATM offering. While I am not a financial expert, I will offer the following: 

1) This agreement exists to ALLOW the company to raise money through at the market price sales IF it needs too. They haven't done any dilution or raised any money yet, and there is not a guarantee that they will.

From the agreement:

"Under the ATM equity offering sales agreement, sales of common stock, if any, through BP Capital, will be made by means of ordinary brokers’ transactions, in negotiated transactions, to or through a market maker other than on an exchange or otherwise, at market prices prevailing at the time of sale, at prices related to such prevailing market prices, or at negotiated prices and/or any other method permitted by law."

2) In my opinion -- a company beginning a major ramp-up of production and sales, should have maximum financial flexibility. We may well be financially set for any contingencies that occur during ramp up - then again, it's possible that some unforeseen problem, expense -- or opportunity may present itself that requires a rapid response from the company. Having the ability to raise funds as necessary is sound strategic and financial management.

3) It is possible that the price may spike significantly higher in the near future with a product announcement. If those circumstances occur and the company has this particular agreement in its pocket, the company could easily and rapidly raise money for operations or reserves with minimal impact on the shareholders.

4) ATM funding can be an indicator that some positive news about a company is imminent. From Wikipedia "ATMs can be positioned in advance of an upcoming liquidity event or major milestone to take advantage of increased liquidity and a rising stock price.^"  From Morrison-Foerster

5) Consider the Market Capitalization implications: I have compared the market cap of MicroVision to that of Oculus Rift before. (I believe they are comparable, and the value comparison is interesting. The explanation is here.)

So,  consider MicroVision at a market cap equivalent to Oculus Rift of 2 billion dollars. 

With the current 46,220,000 shares, Microvision is worth $43.27/share.

If MicroVision uses ALL of the ATM tomorrow, and creates 2 million shares to raise six million dollars.... with the same Market cap as Oculus Rift, Microvision shares would be worth $41.47.

I found the following reference about ATM programs: 

From Goodwin-Proctor

"Benefits of an ATM Offering Program

Raising equity capital through an ATM offering program can provide a number of benefits to public companies as compared to traditional methods of capital raising, particularly during periods of high market volatility like the current one, including:

• the company has flexibility to control the timing of sales, amount of sales and minimum acceptable price;
• the company can raise equity opportunistically, as-and-when-needed, and can precisely match the sources and uses of funds;
• efficient sales management can mitigate volatility by selling more during periods of stock price strength and slowing/halting sales during periods of stock price weakness;
• the incremental nature of sales means that the company stands to benefit from a rising stock price;3
• instructions to the placement agent can be reassessed or revoked at any time, even intraday;
• sales are typically discreet/anonymous over an ECN, or electronic communications network;
• the placement agent provides continuous market feedback and can compare actual sales prices to VWAP over the same period;
• overall cost of issuance is generally significantly less than that of a traditional underwritten offering;
• program can be put in place relatively quickly (3-4 weeks), with no road-show or other sales efforts required; and
• no lock-up is usually required from directors, officers or significant shareholders."

PopSlate -- a great concept MicroVision could do one better.

PopSlate's device was featured on CNBC this morning. It is a "second screen" for an iPhone that features an always on grayscale screen on a phone case.

It's an interesting concept, but not the most interesting concept. It will be interesting to see how much traction it gets in the market.

The MOST interesting concept, will be the case with an incorporated PicoP projector that is hard-connected to the phone with an instant-on feature. Want to show a picture? Push the button on the case, and show it on the wall three feet across.




At re/code 

PopSlate.com

From the video below, I can imagine doing a similar marketing video for a case with PicoP inside. -- I'm biased, but I like the PicoP idea better.

SONY Bullish

Key point from recent Conference call.... 

Alex Tokman - President and CEO

The only thing I can tell is, that they [SONY] are very bullish on this opportunity. Just look at the numbers, they invested in us, including purchase orders, $32 million, $33 million over the past three years. If somebody does this, and it’s a fraction of what they spend internally to support this proposition and get it to market, you would think that they are motivated to make it successful. And so we really-really like this relationship, and both sides are going to work as true partners, helping each other in difficult times, and we hope that Sony will become very successful from this proposition, and hopefully we will become successful, because they become successful.

If you look at Sony's recent financial quarterly results, they invest in the areas that focus on organic growth of Sony business unit, and that's one of the initiatives that they fund, while they divest from low-end cell phones, television sets, etcetera. So Sony as a corporation is actually investing into the areas where we are attached."

Displays you Wear - Updated

From Photonics.com

Check out the full article at the original source.

Note that the image of the glasses below does look quite similar to what is described for the Hololens system, and also quite similar to the glasses shown here: ValveAR

---

The laser scanning projection system enables augmented reality wearable glasses. Photo courtesy of MicroVision.

“Often overlooked is the whole human-machine interface. That’s the biggest problem,” said Bharath Rajagopalan, general manager for business development and marketing at projection display maker MicroVision Inc. of Redmond, Wash. The company’s laser beam scanning technology can be incorporated into augmented reality products, including head-up and retinal scanning displays. 

“We’ve been ready for a long time,” 
Rajagopalan said of the company’s decade-old augmented reality technology. “We have good, sharp text. It’s very crisp, very readable, very high contrast.” 

Originally developed for the military, MicroVision’s lightweight head-worn displays deliver images that appear to the user as though on a see-through computer screen – thus a technician can view instructions on jet engine repair while performing the task. 

Originally developed for the military, augmented reality technology allows information to be displayed and shared outdoors. Photo courtesy of Applied Research Associates.

---

What’s needed in addition to a quality display is infrastructure, according to Rajagopalan, which includes access to data, sufficient computing power and the right software. 

A laser scanning projection system by MicroVision. Photo courtesy of MicroVision.

"everyone who saw it in use immediately wanted one" - Review

At Trulynet.com

One more way to expand your horizons- getting beyond the tiny screen on your phone. The Celluon PicoAir is a pico-projector that is designed specifically for use with Android devices, and their Miracast wireless protocol. Thanks to their laser engine, it offers HD 1920x720p resolution (with even more pixels than standard 720p) and an impressive 80,000:1 contrast ratio and laser brightness. Whether you’re camping and want to view some daily photos or videos in your camper or tent, or want a 100-inch screen to show your friends the latest music video or project, there’s no denying that a pico-projector can be pretty handy.

The company brags about their infinite focus, which means that you don’t need to fiddle with knobs, and we did notice that images were surprisingly sharp even up close. That’s a nice boost from other picos that we’ve seen. There aren’t any settings for you to play with though, keystone adjustments or otherwise. As with most small projectors, battery life isn’t amazing, but is enough to get you through most feature films (perhaps not the Avengers movies though, expect a bit over two hours). The PicoAir weighs in at only eight ounces, little enough that you’ll barely notice it even if you’re hiking, plus it was made to have fairly similar dimensions as most smartphones. There are built-in speakers so you can enjoy a theater in your pocket, and thankfully, there is no whirring fan to distract you. It won’t get too loud though- it might not even overpower your phone, and was quieter than our test tablets.

"Lasers continue to surprise and astound, and rarely with as much force as with the Celluon PicoAir. If this is the future, count us excited- "

SONY -- cutting losing divisions - investing heavily in partnership with MicroVision

"Sony is VERY bullish on our technology."

When a company is mercilessly cutting losing divisions, yet investing 33 million directly with MicroVision -- which is a small part of what they're doing in-house, you know they are dedicated to this technology, and expect it to be a significant winner.

These are very outstanding forecasts (which they call "conservative") from SONY. I expect it is unlikely that they can increase their devices income so significantly without adding a NEW kind of device to their product line up.

This morning's call MicroVision mentioned SONY many times openly. It is my opinion that we hear of a product release from SONY sooner, rather than later.

MicroVision and SONY have an eight year partnership contract on this technology -- until 2023!!

Full Article at BloombergBusiness

Kazuo Hirai, leading Sony Corp. on a comeback after years of losses, is giving himself plenty of room to deliver more good news in the future.

The chief executive officer says operating profit will more than quadruple to 320 billion yen ($2.7 billion) this fiscal year. That forecast given Thursday is about 20 percent less than analysts projected as Sony tries to shake its years-long reputation for disappointing investors.

Hirai is cutting costs and focusing on profitability in businesses where Sony has an advantage. That approach, coupled with Chief Financial Officer Kenichiro Yoshida’s emphasis on accountability, has helped boost the stock 103 percent in the past year.

“We have revised our forecasts down 15 times in the past seven years, and that’s not something we want to repeat,” Yoshida said in Tokyo. “The profit forecast takes into account a considerable risk from foreign exchange fluctuations.”

Sony forecast a 17 percent surge in revenue from devices, the unit that makes image sensors, and a 16 percent increase in the pictures division. New releases this year include “Spectre,” the latest installment in the James Bond franchise.

The earnings revival comes after Hirai sold Sony’s personal-computer business, pruned its smartphone lineup and placed the TV manufacturing business into a separate structure to boost performance after years of losses. It also started selling the PlayStation 4 console in China to tap the world’s biggest game market.

Smartphone Revamp

“The target of operating profit is conservative,” said Hideki Yasuda, an analyst at Ace Research Institute in Tokyo. “Investors expected too much so Sony is trying to lower their expectations.”

Sony stopped developing new smartphones for China and culled the Xperia lineup as it struggled to compete with Apple Inc., Samsung Electronics Co. and Chinese vendors. The company took a 180 billion-yen charge in the business last fiscal year.

The company boosted investment in semiconductors by 150 billion yen this year to tap surging demand for the sensors that power cameras in Apple and Samsung smartphones. It’s also shifting 220 employees involved in developing and producing chips for gaming consoles to the sensor business and other operations.