Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) is developing a successor for the previous virtual reality experience device, this time not made out of cardboard. The company is planning to launch the solid-plastic device later this year.
The new virtual-reality headset for smartphones adds an extra support for the technology of Android operating systems and at the same time challenges Facebook’s Oculus technology for an early lead in Silicon Valley’s latest platform war, as reported by The Financial Times.
The latest Google design VR goggles called Cardboard -actually made of cardboard in a low-cost goal planned – was a biggest success than the giant have ever imagined. As new features, the new VR headset will have better sensors, lenses and a more solid plastic casing, said people familiar with the not officially-announced technology.
The headset will be similar to the Gear VR developed by Samsung and Oculus released to the public last year. Google is expected to release the new VR gadget alongside new Android VR software that poses an advantage to its competitors. Is known at this time, that the new device will be using a smartphone the same way as the others VR goggles do, by putting it into the front of the user’s head.
In comparison to Samsung’s device, the Google headset will be compatible with a larger amount of smartphones than the Gear VR, which only is compatible with the latest Samsung models. This is an effort of the Alphabet’s company to expand the reach of their technology.
The new goggles are also hoped to improve the quality of the mobile VR viewing by embedding new software into the smartphone’s operating system, so they will not rely on traditional apps and at the same time offer manufacturers the option to create new application to this technology.
“VR is too important and too powerful medium to be accessible to only a few,” said Clay Bavor, who previously led both Google’s apps and VR units and just became full-time head of Cardboard and related products.
He added in an interview for Time magazine that the creation of a mobile VR headset that works with more than just a single software or just a few smartphones will mark the opening for a new front in Google’s wide-ranging rivalry with Facebook.
Source: The Financial Times