When Google introduced its Google Glass smartglasses four years ago, it
turned to Glass-sporting skydivers buzzing a San Francisco convention
center, Glass-adorned models at a glitzy fashion show and a Twitter
campaign to notify early "Glass Explorers" of their luck in snagging a
pair.
This year, when Microsoft showed off an early edition of its
HoloLens augmented-reality goggles, it took the opposite approach:
targeting the software developers it needs to make the device useful. No
stunts. No fashion spreads. No consumer marketing at all.
The
discreet launch reflects the daunting hurdles confronting the nascent
industry of augmented reality, known in the industry as AR. Such devices
overlay images as holograms onto a user's real-life field of vision,
with the goal of improving efficiency at businesses ranging from
doctors' offices to factory floors.
Some industry veterans see it
as an even bigger opportunity than its cousin, virtual reality, which
completely immerses users in an artificial world. But early efforts
around augmented reality, including Google Glass and Microsoft's own
predecessor to HoloLens called Kinect, have sputtered.
"They're
taking a more measured approach with HoloLens, and it's the right
strategy," said Tipatat Chennavasin, general partner at the Venture
Reality Fund, which invests in augmented-reality and virtual-reality
start-ups. "You don't want to overhype it and get people very
disappointed, and that's what happened with Google Glass."
The
market research consultancy Digi-Capital predicts the AR industry could
be worth $90 billion (roughly Rs. 6,08,702 crores) annually by 2020. That's triple the projections for
total sales in virtual reality.
Google, Microsoft, Facebook and
Sony are among the many tech firms that are betting on augmented
reality, virtual reality or both. The traditional methods of interacting
with a computer - usually featuring a keyboard or a touch screen -
will eventually seem quaint as these technologies proliferate, many in
the industry believe.
"Microsoft has a huge opportunity here, that
is: to create a market for holographic, mixed reality and to dominate
it," said J.P. Gownder, an analyst at Forrester Research. Success, he
said, would mean selling hundreds of thousands of units by the end of
2017 to businesses.
But history suggests augmented and virtual reality still have along way to go.
Virtual
reality developers, newly energized by the release of Facebook's Oculus
headset, have focused on gaming, but no "killer app" - must-have
software that motivates someone to buy a device - has yet emerged. Many
users still experience problems with nausea, which plagued earlier
virtual reality efforts.
Google announced last week a big virtual
reality initiative, and players in the space ranging from start-up Leap
Motion to smartphone maker HTC have generated plenty of buzz. But many
of the promised products have yet to hit the market.
Augmented
reality, meanwhile, seems destined at this stage for specialized niches
in industries such as medicine and manufacturing. Google has shifted its
focus too and no longer sells Glass to consumers, who found few useful
things to do with the devices. Glass is still available to developers.
"It
took Google a long way to evolve to a more substantive approach," said
Ian Shakil, chief executive of Augmedix, a San Francisco startup that
recently raised $17 million for a smart-glass system for doctors that
automatically records patient data.
Legacy of Kinect
The
HoloLens traces its lineage to Kinect, an add-on for Microsoft's Xbox
gaming console that was introduced in 2010. Kinect turned user gestures
into commands, and deployed sensors and cameras to map the rooms where
it was set up, creating the foundation for a more immersive gaming
experience.
Consumers liked Kinect, but it never lived up to its
full potential, in part because it spawned no blockbuster games.
Microsoft failed to persuade top gaming studios to invest seriously in
Kinect, developers say, and by 2014 it was no longer being included with
Xbox consoles.
But the Kinect technology found a second life in
the HoloLens, which enables users to control holograms through finger
bends in a motion called the "air tap." Kinect developer Alex Kipman and
much of his team also led the creation of HoloLens.
The new
product, which sells in its developer version for $3,000, featured
prominently at Microsoft's recent software developers conference in San
Francisco, with participants donning goggles to take a tour of Mars led
by a hologram of astronaut Buzz Aldrin. They also played with the "air
tap," which controls a hologram's movements much as a mouse manipulates
icons on a computer screen.
But Microsoft makes it clear the
playfulness takes a back seat to purpose. It plans to "cultivate a
thriving developer community and to foster a vibrant app ecosystem,"
according to a company spokesperson.
Tim Gabrhel, a developer at
IT consultancy Concurrency who attended the Build conference, talked
about how useful HoloLens would be for maintaining industrial-scale
printing equipment. Workers probing malfunctioning parts, he explained,
could get tailored instructions beamed onto the screen, or perhaps a
hologram of a skilled technician showing how to make repairs.
Ronald van der Putten, a software architect at Honeywell, said the HoloLens could allow hands-free scanning in warehouses.
Brandon
Haase, an engineer at Valorem Consulting, said he could see uses in
insurance: creating inventories of homeowners' belongings by wearing a
HoloLens during a walk-through of a house, for example.
James
Ashley, a software developer in Atlanta and an expert on Kinect, said
Microsoft was aiming to "fix a mistake seen with the Kinect, that the
Kinect was for gamers" only.
"They're trying to align this new technology with their core business" of building technology for corporations, he said.
Eventually, perhaps some time in 2017, Microsoft will likely unveil a consumer version of HoloLens, said Gownder, the analyst.
"Over
time, less expensive hardware would create a larger market," he said,
adding he expected the first consumer HoloLens to be priced under
$1,500.
© Thomson Reuters 2016
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Further reading:
AR,
Apps,
Augmented Reality,
Daydream,
Facebook,
Gaming,
Google,
Google Glass,
Google Glass 2,
HTC,
HoloLens,
Home Entertaiment,
Microsoft,
Microsoft HoloLens,
Oculus,
Sony,
VR,
Virtual Reality,
Wearables
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