Featured article by Andrew Cioffi, marketing specialist and writer
When virtual reality was first presented to the world as a viable, somewhat affordable option for the average electronics consumer to add to their digital lifestyle’s array of gadgets, we all thought we were about to witness a revolution. Everyone felt that we were on the verge of something like the smartphone explosion we witnessed with the launch of the first iPhone way back when. The reality, so far, in all honesty, has been far from overwhelming. It’s been rather disappointing, to be honest.
The VR headset, is still a long way from becoming the common household item we all thought it would be, with its first year of mass availability seeing it record sales of a paltry $1.8 billion. Where’s the problem? Nobody seems to have a good answer just yet.
While we’ve seen some great and innovative concepts being applied in various fields such s construction and healthcare, the signs of strain in VR startup companies are unmistakable, with quite a few announcing layoffs or shutting down their VR operations completely. With all that going on, however, there still seems to be hope at the end of the virtual reality tunnel, and companies willing to place their bets on virtual reality stocks.
Here’s a look at some of the die-hard VR startups that show some promising signs of life in the virtual reality arena.
Hypereal
The Chinese aren’t ones to be left too far behind in matter technological, and the race to be at the crest of the VR wave is no exception to this rule. The fully Chinese startup came into being in 2015, and has managed to amass roughly $10 million in investor funding, enabling it become the only virtual reality – focused Chinese entity with a full VR software ecosystem, including 360-degree position tracking systems, interactive controllers, and a VR headset.
With a going rate of $473, Hypereal’s Pano 360 compares reasonably well with HTC’s Vive when it comes to price and is on the same level with Oculus and Vive in performance terms. They seem to have an edge when it comes to the performance of their room-scale positioning capabilities, which are said to be in the sub-millimeter range, offering up a crisper and more realistic experience for users.
Sliver.tv
Sliver.tv took in about $36 million back in 2915 when the Silicon Valley startup proposed to set up a live-streaming platform that would allow viewers to actually (well, virtually) step into the action of competitive video games and look around to see what’s going on around them. Samsung and Sony being among the investors was only icing on the cake, as the e-sports world is set to see increasingly massive growth as the next frontier in sporting for a millennial generation that’s still attached to their consoles.
Fyusion
This San Francisco startup proposed to develop a tech solution that would make use of 3-D computer vision combined with machine learning to essentially create intelligent images’.
They took out more than 50 patents ton their original tech ideas with which they intend to make it possible for anyone to build up interactive, immersive 3-D imagery they labeled fyuses’. This is to be done quite simply by moving the camera around the person or object in question. It doesn’t take too much brainpower to see just how useful such a solution might be in certain sectors such as classified ads, real estate listings, and many more.
Immersv
This might not be the favorite innovation in the VR world from a consumer’s point of view, but what Immersv proposed to do was sweet music to the ears of product manufacturers and salespeople. What the 2015 Emeryville startup received $10.5 million to deliver was a way for companies to insert immersive, interactive advertisements into the virtual reality environment.
The promise they made was to deliver advertising experiences that were eight times more memorable than traditional ads. They seem to have convinced some of heavy industry players who would like to see their brands reach out to potential customers in the VR world, as they already possess a rather extensive portfolio of notable brands that they are working with. It might be just the right time to pick up some virtual reality stocks. They might just be able to offer up some of the highest consumer engagement rates we’ve seen thus far if all goes according to plan.
About the Author
Andrew Cioffi is a marketing specialist and a writer. He lives with his wife and two children on the sunny shores of Australia, but dearly misses his home in the cold German north.
