Then very little happened on the ar front apart from the Pokémon Go fever that hit the world just over a year ago, where the ar bit was a less exciting part of the game if you ask me. For the past 3-4 years, the focus has instead been on vr (virtual reality) in the form of clumsy helmets and pixelated games that have made me nauseous several times. And the success of Playstation VR and Samsung Gear VR did not materialize.
Microsoft is now investing heavily in its new concept Mixed reality, which mixes VR and AR. In practice, it is about a standard where you should be able to put on a headset and be able to experience a combination of real and virtual image. We saw several examples of new exciting headset models from, among others, Asus, HP and Lenovo at the Ifa fair in Berlin last autumn.
Google is also betting hard on ar in the form of the developer tool AR-core, which will enable new cool ar apps for the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Google’s own Pixel headphones. But it was in connection with Apple releasing iPhone 8 and IOS 11 that the “killer app” came. The app that really made me believe in an upcoming ar boom.
It’s not about some cool game that you can play virtually on your living room table at home, or a cool miniature golf app where you can walk around your house and hit virtual courses in every room. No, the app is called Ikea Place and it allows you to place furniture from the entire Ikea catalog directly in the room at home.
Try different colors, move the virtual sofa around and see how the result will be from different angles.
Microsoft, Google and Apple are all betting hard on ar, and there’s no doubt that the hardware required to deliver is already in place. With innovative companies like Ikea that really understand how to take advantage of technology, I think all the conditions are there for an ar revolution.
Mikael Lindkvist: Flärpgate and old technology – now everything is at stake for Apple