A significant positive impact on the world

I am certain that 3D computing is going to have a major positive impact for people. 

Here's the best illustration of how that will happen I've seen yet.



Guides

Investor Presentation

Missed the audio portion, so looking for a recording. There's great stuff in here!

This year.

It's looking like very healthy upgrade cycles built into the business. (Think personal computers in the 1980's and 1990's) Those upgrade cycles made a lot of investors rich.

First thing that jumped out, is what appears to be the form-factor for consumer LiDAR. What I take from this is that it's almost certainly a home-security application. (it's stand alone, and not a portable design.... ) And apparently stand-alone from a smart speaker --- where we're already looking for participation. (better picture of it later....)

Products LAUNCHED in volume, 2nd half of this year. (Of course "volume" is a word that needs interpretation, but when you're dealing with Tier #1 OEMS, huge volumes are likely. (We've seen this stuff in action and it's amazing)

Anticipate seeing products launched in volume in the 2nd half of this year

This is selling shovels to gold miners.

MicroVision is focused on enabling unique Input / Output solutions for Artificial Intelligence connected products and services targeting 4 market verticals 

Smart speaker form factor of MVIS engine:  The embedded TOF display isn't included in the module shown at WPG yet, but the comparison is very interesting.

Microvision Interactive at WPG Holdings 

Some AR coolness...

Look at the intro page, then fast forward to 6:20 ( and have some time.)



(@ 9:32)

Magic Leap, Layers on the earth

This is the best explanation I've seen so far about the impact mixed reality can have.

As though you could turn on different notation for the world. Most of us won't want to see energy and water or communications layers. Being able to see a "transportation" layer could help us find our way around a large city with multiple modes of public transport.

This would be incredible at helping us do things.

And they plan a LOT of entertainment layers.

Futurism

Magic Leap Blog

the “Magicverse,” a series of digital layers that would exist in AR over the physical world.

Three new Microvision Videos

Thanks Fru

Hololens 3

Could it match a humans full field of view..

Of course we know about the idea of foveated rendering... and have for a while.

Last summer here... 

Hololens 3 Digital Trends


Kipman notes that Microsoft’s team can eventually develop a headset that matches a human’s field of view. It would be accomplished by what Kipman is referring to as “foveated rendering,” something not yet available on the current HoloLens. This technique would allow holograms to appear in high quality only in the direct view of a HoloLens wearer, but then dissipate as they move into the corners of the viewer’s eyesight. This would represent an improvement over the current generation HoloLens, where holograms projected through the headset fade as the user moves closer to them.

United States Patent Application 20180176551 Viswanathan; P. Selvan ; et al. June 21, 2018
Applicant: Microvision, Inc.

Devices and Methods for Providing Foveated Scanning Laser Image Projection with Depth Mapping
FIELD

Magic Leap, Facebook, Google, Microsoft...

The whole article is interesting. It tells me that Microsoft is really ahead of the curve with display, and some of their competitors really don't know that they are yet.

Reminding me of how Apple had developers working on content that will work with glasses (while working for iPhones and iPads.)

The article teases "When" but doesn't do a good job of answering it... although there are two very important take-aways:

THE FUTURE OF COMPUTERS IS SPATIAL

The people and companies above, and others like them, will have to listen closely to successfully navigate the technological shift over the next decade.

Everything that is on a flat screen is second to something that is in 3D --- Give it 20 years and kids will look at flat screens like a lot of us look at black and white televisions or rotary phones.

And, this is a process that is going to involve numerous upgrade cycles over a decade or more, this is all just beginning. Like tube televisions or LCD screens, I think the laser near eye display is going to be the best solution for a decade or more... 


Fast Company

What we really want to know is what we always want to know: How soon? When will the “Magicverse,” as Magic Leap calls it, be as accessible as picking up a svelte pair of XR glasses from my night table and putting them on?

A better question is how quickly the technology is moving toward a more refined experience, and what challenges remain. To find out, I asked experts from various companies that will play big roles in the developing XR ecosystem. (Some responses have been lightly edited for clarity.)

****

It’s about all those digital layers working together and providing you information. And that information could be a bus route. Or if you’re an engineer it could be about understanding what the sewage system looks like underneath the city. These functional layers are almost like radio stations in a way. You can tune into the transportation layer, which might say here’s where all the buses are, here’s where all the Ubers are, here’s where all the trains are, here’s where all the flying Ubers are!

“But then you might tune into the entertainment one. There will be dozens, hundreds, thousands of the entertainment ones alone. (LAYERS) You know we love to be entertained as humans. So you could tune into the Game of Thrones channel and you’re walking down the Embarcadero and there’s a dragon flying and you’re seeing it and I’m seeing it and we’re interacting with it and we’re having this shared experience. You think of Pokémon Go, but much more realistic and much more engaging because now you’re able to see in three dimensions that character happening. That’s what we mean when we talk about ‘the Magicverse.’ It’s all about serving that digital content.”

“[Customers] did tell us a number of things we could improve on with the HoloLens 2, and the ones we chose to concentrate on were immersion, comfort, and usefulness out of the box.

“Looking forward we will continue to invest in those same three categories. What you’ll see in the next version is even more immersiveness, more comfort, and more applications that have more value. It’s relatively easy to do any one of those things but it’s hard to do all three.

“You can make it more immersive by including more powerful displays, but that’s going to make the device bigger, heavier, hotter, and have a shorter battery life. You can make it more comfortable by making it weigh less, but then you give up computing power. So it’s relatively easy to do any one of those things–the challenge is achieving advancements in all three areas. 

FOR FACEBOOK, AR/VR’S KILLER APP IS TOGETHERNESS

Facebook is thought to have some of the best computer vision and spatial computing talent in the industry working on social experiences in VR (like Spaces), and on AR experiences for smartphone apps like Instagram, Messenger, and Facebook. Facebook’s first consumer product, the Portal home speaker/camera, offers some AR experiences–expect the company to add more in the future. The company owns Oculus, which develops VR headsets, but it’s likely exploring options for releasing more of its own AR hardware products in the future.

*****

It’ll be consumers that decide these things over time. The people and companies above, and others like them, will have to listen closely to successfully navigate the technological shift over the next decade.

Planting Seeds, Rolling dice

While everyone is focused on Hololens, I just remind myself that there's a lot of room in Augmented Reality that is beyond Hololens. The makers of those systems will be looking for the best display. 

There's another company that has a lot of patents that mention MicroVision.

Remember they're getting developers to create AR content BEFORE they have a specifically AR device to use to do it.


AppleInsider
Cook claimed he's "never been more optimistic" about where Apple is going, according to Bloomberg. The company saw a rough December quarter in which iPhone sales fell 15 percent year-over-year, and most analysts don't expect them to resume growth until this fall's models ship.

The executive didn't elaborate on what future products he meant, but Apple is known to be working on an augmented reality headset and self-driving car technology. Both are potential gambles, given intense competition in the autonomous car space, and the absence of any affordable, mainstream AR headsets. Products like the Magic Leap One and Microsoft's HoloLens have so far targeted niche audiences like businesses.

Starting at :53 --- A Miracle

I'm a little late getting to this one, but totally worth it.

A lot of questions answered.

They must have badgered him about a consumer version -- to which he denied again, which is GREAT news for this kind of platform.

Facebook -- Enterprise AR

I'm pretty sure all of the AR systems (careful word choice --'system') created will be display agnostic. Different companies will build various systems of software, sensors, content, and input. They will then use the best of whatever accessories will be available in the market.

The leaders now are each going to try to become the standard, to become at the start the most accepted version will be huge. Some other player may well appear and work to compete with Microsoft on price -- or on content. As we have seen many times in the past, those players who have chosen the right content concentration may beat a superior technology.

There will be room for multiple players in the field -- some may produce entertainment over education, or consumer over enterprise.... eventually I suspect it will be like Apple vs Android or Mac vs PC. A couple of strong contenders -- but there are a lot of them now.


The payoff for whichever company dominates in this field is going to be HUGE. It will be bigger than dominating the personal computing surge in the 1980's.

Selling the best near eye display (and having the best sensors) will be like selling shovels to gold miners.


Facebook is in the race for "enterprise AR" and they have a significant presence in Redmond. Their existence in Redmond Washington is an "open secret."

They don't advertise their presence at all. A couple of years ago I was given a heads-up about their facility there and I stopped at it. Not only were the buildings unmarked -- just normal looking office buildings.... but there was no indication on any person or any vehicle what was there. (No Facebook Stickers, Logos, Shirts, no labeled visitor spot.. nothing of the kind.)

I took a couple of pictures.

A couple of hours later, my phone asked me if I wanted to label the pictures I took at Oculus.

Facebook is growing at a rapidly in Redmond.


Mashable

Facebook wants to sell more virtual reality headsets to businesses.

The company is working on an "enterprise edition" of its Oculus Go and Oculus Quest headsets, according to a new job posting that was first discovered by Variety.

The job listing is for a software engineer position on Oculus' AR/VR Enterprise team. Though light on specifics, it says enterprise editions of its headsets will launch in 2019.

"Starting with VR, we are building an Oculus Go and Oculus Quest Enterprise edition expected to launch in 2019," the description says.

Facebook has previously dabbled in this space. The company has offered Oculus Business, Rift bundles meant to appeal to businesses, since 2017. But a dedicated enterprise version of its hardware would be a significant expansion for Oculus. The job description suggests Facebook is working on partnerships with "enterprise-developer ecosystems" and other software platforms in order to create business-specific features.