LAS VEGAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--At CES® 2017 today, ODG (Osterhout Design Group), a leading developer and manufacturer of smartglasses and augmented, virtual and mixed reality technologies, announced the unveiling of R-8 and R-9, two innovative and disruptive new devices that will expand the portfolio and begin to bridge commercial and consumer markets. ODG will also bring to life its vision for AR-enabled mobile entertainment and computing in partnership with major brands including ODG investor and strategic partner 21st Century Fox, Los Angeles-based cloud rendering company OTOY and PTC, Inc., provider of Vuforia.
“ODG is keeping up a rapid pace of innovation, taking lessons learned over many decades building smartglasses and using them to develop and refine our technology to produce glasses that are optimized for many users – including heavy and light enterprise, professionals and consumers,” said Ralph Osterhout, Founder and CEO of ODG. “ODG is pioneering glasses for the masses that play movies with cinematic clarity, drop you inside immersive 3D interactive experiences, and reveal new worlds of invention and productivity. This is so much bigger than just a device, it’s about a whole new computing medium that will transform how we interact with and discover information and engage with people and objects in the world around us.”
CES Content Showcase
ODG is previewing a number of flagship consumer entertainment experiences at CES 2017 and invites attendees to stop by their booth. Highlights include:
- 21st Century Fox, through the Fox Innovation Lab, has collaborated with ODG to create experiences that will evolve smartphone applications from handheld to headworn and highlight best-in-class cinematic and other entertainment experiences that only ODG can deliver on its compact, mobile smartglasses. Examples include viewing videos, playing games, or reading news articles or books in innovative, imaginative ways. CES visitors will get a sneak peek in the ODG booth, with content from 20th Century Fox, FOX Broadcasting Company, FX, FOX Sports, National Geographic and Fox News Channel.
- A cutting-edge immersive augmented reality demonstration inspired by 20th Century Fox’s ALIEN franchise. VIP visitors will see the proof of concept brought to life on ODG’s devices.
- A visual presentation developed with OTOY that shows off OTOY’s Octane. Come by ODG's booth to see OTOY's latest rendering and light field technology for VR and mixed reality, which will be integrated in Unity 2017.
- ODG will also showcase other AR demos powered by Vuforia, including the world’s first interactive racing game that combines augmented, virtual and mixed reality; augmented football, a game day game changer, and an illustration of our screenless future.
Industry Leading Technology – R-8 and R-9
R-8 brings the power of mobile virtual computing to early consumer adopters, providing access to movies, sports, gaming, navigation and news articles and books, but on smartglasses that are smaller and sleeker than any other device in ODG’s portfolio, weighing just under 4.5 ounces. R-8 offers High Definition resolution in a large, greater than 40˚ field-of-view (FOV) private screen that floats in your view, wherever you are and however you are moving, with added augmented, virtual and mixed reality overlays.
R-9 is based on ODG’s award-winning 50° FOV and 1080p Project Horizon platform, and is a winner in three CES 2017 Innovation Award categories. Targeted to a variety of WFOV experiences from light enterprise to prosumer media consumption, it is also a development platform for sophisticated mobile AR/VR and smartglasses applications.
ODG is the first to announce devices using the Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 835 processor, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.’s highest performance and most power efficient mobile processor. Both devices benefit from advanced features within Qualcomm Technologies’ Snapdragon VR SDK, such as hardware accelerated, visual inertial odometry based six degrees of freedom (6DoF) motion tracking.
R-8 and R-9 are also expected to support PTC’s Vuforia, the most widely used AR platform for developers. Vuforia allows 3D content to be placed in real world environments enabling developers to create compelling consumer and commercial AR applications. Vuforia also addresses some of the unique technology challenges of smartglasses by providing system-wide optimizations for motion-to- photon latency, and accurate alignment of digital content with the physical world.
R-9 will be priced around $1,799 with initial shipping targeted 2Q17, while R-8 will be less than $1,000 with developer units shipping 2H17.
The R-8 and R-9 will join the R-7, a device shipping since November 2015 that brings value to Fortune 500 companies and small enterprises alike. Together, the expanded R-series will produce the largest portfolio of mobile, integrated, high performance smartglasses on the planet.
For more product specifics, visit: www.osterhoutgroup.com/products.
“ODG smartglasses are already in use and set the standard in industries across the entire spectrum of business. Our commitment to our commercial customers remains unchanged, but we are starting to see the pull of the early adopter phase for consumer smartglasses as VR and AR emerge as new computing platforms, form factors improve and people want more out of their mobile devices,” said Pete Jameson, COO of ODG. “We are excited to begin engaging developers and introduce compelling consumer experiences to seed adoption.”
Call for Developers: Leverage ODG’s Platform Today
ODG’s open standard Android platform provides an ideal stage for software developers interested in porting existing or creating new applications on ODG smartglasses. With support for Vuforia, R-8 and R-9 will be accessible by a growing ecosystem of more than 300,000 registered developers who have developed more than 35,000 AR applications.
ODG’s new devices offer an exciting opportunity to enter a nascent and growing market, and anyone interested in learning more can visit www.osterhoutgroup.com/developers or visit ODG at CES, booth 26236 in the LVCC South Hall 2.
Notes to Editors
Today’s announcement comes hot on the heels of ODG’s first funding round, a record-breaking $58 million round that is the largest ever Series A in wearables, and the Company’s recently disclosed deal with China Mobile’s MIGU. Both transactions strongly position ODG to capitalize on the mass market in 2017.
About ODG
San Francisco based ODG was founded in 1999 as a technology incubator and today is the leading developer and manufacturer of mobile headworn computing and augmented, virtual and mixed reality technologies and products. ODG’s amazing devices are changing the way we view the world. ODG is privately held and was historically self-funded. In December 2016 it announced a $58 million Series A funding with strategic investors including 21st Century Fox, Shenzhen O-film Tech Co., Ltd., and Vanfund Urban Investment & Development Co. Ltd. The Series A is the largest ever in wearables, augmented and virtual reality.
To learn more about how we’re changing the face of computing, visit ODG’s website, Twitter and Facebook pages.
Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. is a subsidiary of Qualcomm Incorporated. Qualcomm and Snapdragon are trademarks of Qualcomm Incorporated, registered in the United States and other countries.
Qualcomm Snapdragon is a product of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.
Vuforia is a product of PTC Inc.
