Virtual reality (VR) is a big stepping stone for a lot of companies, including Facebook, Microsoft, and even Google in some aspects, so it’s no surprise that some are already expecting Apple to jump in.
As it stands, Apple is one major company in the tech industry that hasn’t announced any plans for anything related to virtual reality, or even augmented reality. Meanwhile, in 2014, Facebook purchased Oculus for $2 billion — a company that brought a lot of attention to virtual reality in the games industry. And in January of this year, Microsoft unveiled what it calls HoloLens, an augmented reality headset that projects a variety of images, including games and more.
VR is set to play a huge part of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada in early 2016, where a plethora of companies will unveil what they believe the next step for the technology rests. However, according to Daniel Ives of FBR & Co., who watches Apple and Microsoft, it’s these two companies that people should be watching. Microsoft is billed as the “wild card” at this point with HoloLens, which could make huge inroads for the company both in the enterprise and consumer markets.
Apple, however, will likely have a huge push in 2016 for virtual (or augmented) reality, but not with any consumer products ready to ship. Instead, Apple’s moves in the market could be all geared towards acquisitions as it builds the technology for a later product, especially in terms of its iPhone ecosystem:
“…very aggressive on the virtual/ augmented reality front through organic as well as acquisitive means in 2016 as this represents a natural next generation consumer technology that plays well into its unrivaled iPhone ecosystem.”
Apple’s focus on virtual reality also extends to patent applications, of which there are many. In February of this year, for instance, it was revealed that the company has a patent application for turning the iPhone into a virtual reality display. And in December of 2014, it was revealed that Apple’s plans for VR could extend to gaming (which it just pushed in a big way with the new Apple TV and the tvOS App Store), as well as with user interfaces.
More recently, though, Apple confirmed it had acquired a company called Faceshift, which builds products focused on motion capture, which could indeed play a big part in Apple’s future plans.
Are you interested to see what Apple could do with VR, or is this one market they should skip?
[via Barrons]
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