AR VR everywhere, but not a clear winner…..

Oct 13, 2020

srajan.kumar

blog

0

Another fast paced week for the AR/VR segment as most of the tech giants are trying to gain a strong foot in this market. Let’s look at some of the buzz:
  • Facebook’s bet on Oculus seems to be finally paying off – OASIS-style VR playground Horizon enters public beta which is comparable in concept if not scope to the fantastical VR world of Ready Player One (Remember Steven Spielberg’s movie, anyone?). It acquired Scape Technologies early this year and other notable acquisitions include – Beat Games, CTRL-Labs, Sanzaru Games etc
  • Apple acquires VR Video Conferencing company Spaces as it continues its buying spree and foray into virtual and augmented reality. Other notable acquisitions in the recent years – NextVR, Camerai, Akonia Holographics, Vrvana, Metaio, SensoMotoric Instruments, IKinema, Faceshift, emotient,Flyby Media etc.
  • Amazon – Patents AR tech to show product reviews on body parts. The idea described in Amazon’s patent would work by making people wear special augmented reality glasses which could be connected to their smartphone.
  • NexTech AR acquires Amazon e-commerce launch platform, Next Level Ninjas. Next Level Ninjas matches brands and product testers on its VIP Product Testers site, helping brands gain business momentum. The platform works across multiple e-commerce platforms including Amazon, eBay, Shopify, Walmart, Jet, and Etsy. By this acquisition it is now able to tie together its augmented reality (AR) offerings for e-commerce into one offering, creating a complete AR e-commerce ecosystem.
These tech companies have been exploring the improvements in AR/VR technologies for quite some time and it seems to be gaining traction.

Let’s look at the market trends in the AR and VR space:

AR

According to Valuates Reports, the global augmented reality and virtual reality market size stood at USD 11.35 Billion, and the industry is forecasted to reach USD 573.96 Billion by 2025, rising at a CAGR of 63.3% between 2018 and 2025.

 

That being said about the active market of AR/VR let’s peek into the trends in patenting AR/VR technologies. The graphs below have been generated using the Dolcera PCS tool.

The graph below shows the top ten jurisdictions for VR and AR patent filings. The US accounts for ~32% of the global IP filings and is at the top place followed by China.

ARVR GeoThe major players are all big tech companies like Microsoft, Sony, Alphabet, Facebook etc. who have been actively filing IP in this segment. A 10 year old startup MagicLeap is amongst the top five spots with its vigorous filings in the last three years.

ARVR CorpLet’s look at the corporate owner trend based on publication year to get a sense of YoY comparison of their filings:

ARVR Corp pubAccording to the graph above, most of the top corporate owners have had a majority of their IP filings in the last two years.

Some of the key areas being researched include eye tracking, haptics etc.

Key Research

Some of the players that seem to have gained some interested in the domain in the recent 5 years is as follows:

New entrants

From the above IP research insights it is clear that the domain is anticipated to have more filings going forward which will be enabled by 5G. Why?
Mobility hindrance due to the current VR devices, battery drain and even sickness caused by VR has been the weakness of this segment but, the adoption of 5G is believed to solve these problems with its fast, stable and high-bandwidth network. The applications of AR/VR will not be limited to only games like Pokemon Go but, will also be applicable to areas like retail, social networking, travel, media and healthcare as well.

With the AR/VR industry still in the early stages, there will be many opportunities for innovative tech startups to get their foot in the door. If you are one and would like to know more about the space and opportunities contact us.

Post by srajan.kumar

Comments are closed.