Business Archives - Page 2 of 119 - VR World

Artificial Intelligence, Auto, Companies, News, startups

Riders in Alphabet’s Waymo Cars Will Now Be Insured

Alphabet Inc.’s Waymo self-driving car group announced a deal with Trov Inc., a venture-backed insurance startup, to provide some reassurance against unexpected events for riders who will be testing its upcoming autonomous shuttle service. The insurance coverage will include several protections for passengers for the duration of each trip including lost property, trip interruption benefits, and medical expense reimbursement. Waymo’s Director of Operations Shaun Stewart said that one of the reasons they chose Trov is that innovative technology needs innovative partners. “Trov is pioneering a cutting-edge approach to insurance that’s ideal for ride-sharing because it’s customized for every trip. As we prepare to launch a commercial

Augmented Reality (AR), Companies, Entertainment, News, startups, Wearables

Magic Leap Finally reveals their AR Goggles

After a really long time of waiting, Magic Leap surprised their fans for christmas by unveiling its augmented reality goggles – Magic Leap One. Dubbed Lightwear, the goggle-style headset promises “amazing experiences that feel natural,” all powered by a hip-mounted, puck-shaped computer called a Lightpack. “Engineered to be lightweight and comfortable for hours of exploration. We’ve combined our Digital Lightfield technology with environment mapping, precision tracking and soundfield audio to produce amazing experiences that feel natural,” it says on their website. In terms of the possibilities of the Magic Leap One, it looks like it has somewhat similar AR features as Microsoft HoloLens and ARKit: digital graphics seamlessly merged

aerospace, Business, Companies, News, Space and Science

Virgin Hyperloop One Raises $50m and Names Branson Chair

In October, we wrote about Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group has invested an undisclosed amount in Hyperloop One, the frontrunner of a number of companies competing to bring Elon Musk’s futuristic vision of a magnetically-propelled high-speed transport system to life. Now, however, it is confirmed that the company got a lifeline in the form of $50m from Russian and Dubai investors. “This investment provides Virgin Hyperloop One with a very robust financial platform for 2018,” chief executive Rob Lloyd said in a statement. “Our focus in 2018 will be on accelerating commercial agreements for both passenger and cargo projects.” The Los Angeles-based start-up also named investor Richard Branson

Augmented Reality (AR), Companies, Entertainment, News, startups, Virtual Reality (VR)

Google-backed Magic Leap Reveals Mixed Reality Music App

Way in October, Magic Leap, the still-in-stealth-mode company developing an augmented-reality headset, announced that it has raised $502 million in Series D equity funding, led by Singapore investment firm Temasek Holdings. The problem was, that at that time, they just promised to create a headset using a type of light-field technology that would result in superior augmented reality experiences, an area most major consumer technology companies are chasing. But it has never given a launch date for its device, nor offered much detail on how it would work. But it seems, something is actually happening. They invited a reporter from Pitchfork, an online music magazine, to

Artificial Intelligence, Business, Companies, Education, News, startups

AI Startup Fano Labs Is Getting Funds From Horizons Ventures

Horizons Ventures, the private Hong Kong based investment arm of Li Ka-shing, the wealthiest man in Hong Kong, has made an “early-stage investment after it backed AI startup” Fano Labs. Horizons is a leading investor in some of the world’s most innovative companies and disruptive technologies, including Facebook, Spotify, Impossible Foods, Improbable, Zoom, Blockstream, Soul Machines and ChromaDex. Now, they decided to put undisclosed money into Fano Labs, which recently graduated AI accelerator program Zeroth. This deal also marks the firm’s first investment in a Hong Kong-based company. “We are a team of scientists and engineers. Our world-class technical expertise in speech and NLP technologies would empower

Apple, Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality (AR), Business, Companies, Facebook, Fintech, Google, Intel, Microsoft, News, Nvidia, Virtual Reality (VR)

Investors Guide: Investing in AI and AR Stocks is the New Gold

The year is coming to an end and if you were thinking about investing in tech companies – now may be the right time. The bullish market still lasts (eighth years in a row now), and this year was pretty good for investors despite the threats of a nuclear or potential trade war and/or crypto currencies rising . Through the end of November, the S&P 500 Index gained 21%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 25%, and the Nasdaq Composite surged 27%. Big technology companies in the Nasdaq 100 Index, tracked by the popular QQQ ETF, have jumped 32% since January. Take AR for

Artificial Intelligence, Auto, Business, Companies, Intel, News, press releases

Collaboration with Waymo ensures Intel leading role in Antonomous Driving

Last week Intel CEO Brian Krzanich revealed that his company supplies processors and other hardware to Waymo, and that Intel would like to continue working with the former Google self-driving car project. The Intel components are used in Waymo’s Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivans, which recently replaced a fleet of small pod-like electric cars as Waymo’s frontline test vehicles. The $15.3 billion acquisition of Mobileye could strengthen Intel in the self-driving vehicle space to offer a variety of items related to self-driving vehicles. These products include cameras, machine learning, sensor chips, roadway mapping, cloud software, and in-car networking. Waymo has a hardware program for sensors, autonomous decision-making, pathfinding, and more.

Blockchain, Business, Companies, Entertainment, Mobile, News, Sport

Leo Messi Becoming Brand Ambasador for Sirin Labs

Sirin Labs, the developer of the Solarin ultra-secure mobile phone, announced that it has signed up Barcelona star Lionel Messi as its brand ambassador. Except the Solarin, the company is now preparing to release an all-in-one PC, called Finney, for Blockchain enthusiasts that will make Blockchain integration much more user-friendly. Messi’s endorsement is meant to open up a wider audience for those who haven’t ever heard of Blockchain technology. In a promotional paid Facebook post, Messi said: “I am usually busy trying to decentralize defenses and after digging deeper into Blockchain and decentralized systems, I’m excited to join Sirin Labs as an ambassador to make

Artificial Intelligence, Business, Companies, Mobile, News, press releases

Drink Your Tequila From AI Interactive Bottle

Last week Astral Tequila (‘Astral’) introduced smart bottles of its award-winning spirit to engage with consumers in-store and deliver customized digital experiences with the tap of a smartphone. The AI interactive spirits bottles featuring NFC technology is said to be the first spirits bottle released in the US, and will be available from stores in California, Texas, Florida, New York, Illinois, New Jersey and Georgia. Astral is collaborating with NFC (near field communications) mobile marketing solutions provider and Thin Film Electronics ASA (‘Thinfilm’). The smart bottles of its tequila will utilize near field communication (NFC) technology to provide exclusive content to smartphone users. An NFC neck

Artificial Intelligence, Auto, Business, Companies, News

Delphi Automotive Creates New Company – Aptiv

Delphi Automotive decided to transform itself from a traditional automotive parts supplier into a tech company focused on autonomous driving. The company is spinning off its powertrain division into a separate entity called Delphi Technologies, and rebranding everything else under a new corporate name — Aptiv. “Delphi Technologies enjoys a balanced revenue mix, robust cost structure and veteran leadership. Also, the company is capable of complying with the strict automotive regulations, pertaining to lowering of the CO2 and other toxic emissions from combustion engines by a considerable amount,”the company announced. They added that Aptiv is now in a position to solve complicated challenges embedded in greener,

Hardware, Opinion, startups, VR World

VR pen project’s developer and development status short on details

A seemingly impressive VR development that came out of “stealth mode” this week remains short on details. Drawboard, which according to its Twitter account is based in San Francisco, appeared rather suddenly on the web last week. Its website is seeking pre-orders for a pen to be used in VR, offering features such as six degree-of-freedom, sub-millimeter tracking; 512 levels of pressure sensitivity; USB charging; and tactile feedback. The pen apparently “works with Windows Mixed Reality headsets or Rift/Vive via Leap Motion,” and will be available in a “limited production run” in early 2018. However, the current state of the product’s development is unclear, as

Artificial Intelligence, Business, Cryptocurrency, Fintech, News

New AI App will tell you is bitcoin going to crash

Have you ever thought that maybe artificial intelligence isn’t just to ‘destroy all humans”, but maybe also to help us? Nowadays when everyone is talking about investing in crypto currencies, and bitcoin price is being bullish to the end, using Artificial Intelligence to predict Crypto currency value seems like a smart idea. Bitcoin Bubble Burst, presented at the Disrupt Berlin hackathon by Claudio Weck, Saad El Hajjaji, and Karthick Perum, watches major price changes for you and tracks news events that could affect prices and alerts you in real time. It thoroughly analyses the trades with deep learning and social media and news with cognitive

Apple, Augmented Reality (AR), Business, Companies, Education, Entertainment, News, Smartphones, Tablets

With Parker AR Bear kids learn through play

I guess many of us remember Tamagotchi or Furby. Those first tech-enhanced toys were already then thought of as a “parents nightmare”. They were blinking, beeping (often in the middle of the night), they needed batteries and sometimes they were a cause of a humongous amount of child tears (when mum accidentaly washed it). However, nowadays it’s easier to live (at least for parents). Parker: Your Augmented Reality Bear is a new iPad and iPhone-enhanced toy from Seedling. This charming bear is fully squeezable with no caveats: it doesn’t have any wires or batteries inside, and it won’t make a peep or start to glow

Business, Companies, Hardware, News, Virtual Reality (VR), VR World

Huawei’s VR Controller Seen In FCC Filing: Headset Closer Than We Think?

A Chinese smartphone manufacturer Huawei may not have extensive mainstream penetration in the West like Apple and Samsung do, but in 2016 they hit #9 in revenue for tech companies around the world. A lot of their success is based in China, and they often trade places with Apple as the 2nd largest smartphone manufacturer in the world. Huawei is a big name in the industry, to say the least. That they’re working on a Gear VR-styled headset has been known for a while: journalists at Road To VR went hands-on with a Huawei VR headset at CES 2017 earlier this year. Now, they’re developing their

Apple, Augmented Reality (AR), Business, Companies, Google, Hardware, Microsoft, Military, News, VR World, Wearables

Apple Manufacturer Quanta Partners With Lumus For AR Displays

Quanta Computer Inc. is a manufacturing partner for Apple and many other hardware manufacturers in the PC/smartphone space. They’re one of the most important companies that consumers have never heard of. Recently, they reached out to Lumus, an Israel-based business that designs displays for AR glasses and headsets. If you recall Google’s “Glass” project from a few years back (which included very limited shipments of Google Glasses), Lumus works on similar hardware and has been doing so for quite a while. In 2008, they sold the PD-18, one of the first AR glasses of its kind, and just a few years later they started producing hardware

Augmented Reality (AR), Business, Companies, News

Starbucks Partners with Alibaba in Opening AR Roastery

China has surpassed U.S. as Starbucks‘ fastest growing market and also the second largest with opening one store in China every 15 hours. Starbucks already operates more than 3,000 stores in the country and 2,000 more by 2021. Focusing on China, Starbucks opened its 30,000 square-feet store, that is now their biggest cafe in the world, in Shanghai. Customers at this beautiful outlet settled on the West Nanjing Road shopping strip, now can watch beans being roasted, sample high-end brews and use a Starbucks augmented-reality digital app to interact with the store. The Shanghai Roastery will also be the first of Starbucks’ 27,000 locations worldwide,

Artificial Intelligence, Business, Companies, Google, News

Google Built AI That Can Build Its Own AI

Back in May of this year Google announced the creation of an AI (AutoML) that is able to design better AIs. AutoML built a new AI that’s called NASNet that is used to recognize objects. NASNet outperformed its human designed counterparts and the methods used to develop it seems to be the future of advanced AI. The Google researchers automated the design of machine learning models using an approach called reinforcement learning. For NASNet, the task was recognizing objects — people, cars, traffic lights, handbags, backpacks, etc. — in a video in real-time. The Google Brain researchers, Barret Zoph, Vijay Vasudevan, Jonathon Shlens, and Quoc Le, claim that their machine-designed model beats all state-of-the-art

Augmented Reality (AR), Business, Companies, Cryptocurrency, Entertainment, Gaming, News, press releases, Virtual Reality (VR)

Gameflip ICO Is Now Live with Target of 15,000 ETH

Following an oversubscribed and successful pre-ICO last month, Gameflip, the veteran Silicon Valley gaming marketplace, has officially launched its highly-anticipated ICO. Crypto and global media have been buzzing about Gameflip, which has been highlighted as a prime example of a successful Silicon Valley startup turned ICO. Gameflip’s digital goods marketplace has 2+ million gamers with millions of USD in transactions each month. With FLIP, its digital token and ecosystem, Gameflip is extending its proven marketplace onto the blockchain — creating significant value for gamers and game publishers. With 2 million registered gamers and 500,000 active monthly users, Gameflip is already the industry’s most comprehensive digital goods

Enterprise, News, startups, Virtual Reality (VR), VR World, Wearables

Varjo Alpha Prototype VR Headset: What You Need To Know

If you haven’t heard of Varjo Technologies yet, there’s a good chance that’ll soon change. The Finnish startup is working on an advanced VR headset, built from modified Oculus Rift’s and other components, and is aimed at professional users. The Varjo Alpha Prototype (a work-in-progress name) offers a 1080p display for each eye, with a 35-degree horizontal FOV for each. There is also a “context display”, which offers a 100 FOV view and runs at 1080 x 1200 at 90hz refresh rate. According to Varjo, the refresh rate on these headsets may eventually go as high as 120hz, for true-to-life motion. While the headset may

Artificial Intelligence, Business, Companies, Education, Facebook, News

Facebook: New AI could prevent suicides

Facebook says it has successfully tested a computer program that can help keep users from taking their own lives. The social media network now says it will expand the use of the pattern recognition software to other countries. In a Facebook post this week, Mark Zuckerberg announced the company is deploying artificial intelligence software that will detect possible suicidal intent among users, which it says it built in consultation with suicide prevention groups. The software will use pattern recognition to identify potentially at-risk individuals, and then alert human Facebook staffers, who will assess the situation and contact emergency responders if needed. “In the last month alone, these A.I. tools have helped us