SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The Venture Reality Fund (“The VR Fund”), a leading global venture capital firm focused on early-stage investments in the augmented, virtual and mixed reality (AR/VR/MR) spaces, today released its AR industry landscape for the second quarter of 2017. The report highlights nearly 150 companies developing infrastructure, tools, platforms and apps for the AR ecosystem and depicts overall industry growth, increased investment and expanding international impact.
“Over the past quarter, the AR industry witnessed several notable moves by major players including Facebook and Apple, which immediately led to a robust increase in developer activity as well as extensive coverage in the market,” said Tipatat Chennavasin, co-founder and general partner at The VR Fund. “These strides are reflective of rising interest in AR driven primarily by device infrastructure and SDK tools.”
The VR Fund evaluated more than 2,000 companies for the landscape, and those selected meet a certain criteria of funding, revenue, mainstream coverage and/or major partnerships.
Key Insights:
- Activity in Q2 was strongest in the areas of device infrastructure and SDK tool development, indicating that AR is still evolving as an industry. These efforts will continue to help advance the growth of apps for consumer and enterprise use in upcoming quarters.
- There was over a 60 percent increase in the number of companies focused on developing AR applications for enterprise from Q1.
- Microsoft Hololens and Google Tango helped lay the groundwork and educate the market about the capabilities of AR, despite limited distribution of their developer kits. Further advancement of these platforms is expected in the near future in response to Apple’s ARKit.
- Google’s advanced Tango technology is proven to deliver an excellent experience capable of augmenting the entire space around a user. However, the existing fragmentation within the Android ecosystem handicaps the rapid development and wide adoption of Tango.
- The introduction of Facebook’s camera platform and Apple’s ARKit inspired an immediate uptick in activity and increased attention for the AR space, particularly related to consumer applications. Early developer response indicates that Apple is becoming a major force in the AR platform war.
- Apple’s move will lead to accelerated growth and experimentation with mobile AR applications. However, the input experience needs to evolve beyond touch to include other modes such as voice.
The VR Fund releases updated VR and AR industry landscapes quarterly, which can be found under the “Resources” section of The Venture Reality Fund’s website.
About The Venture Reality Fund:
The Venture Reality Fund (“The VR Fund”) is a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm focused on early-stage investments in the virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) spaces. The firm invests globally in innovative companies across a wide variety of sectors from infrastructure and development tools to content and applications, to help entrepreneurs bring industry-defining technology to market faster. The firm’s first successful exit, Owlchemy Labs, closed within The VR Fund’s first year of operation.
As part of its commitment to educating and strengthening the ecosystem, The VR Fund publishes industry insights including quarterly global VR and AR landscapes detailing the market’s growth, new investments and increased international impact. The founding team is also a proud partner of the Women in XR initiative, which connects female founders and women-led businesses to capital and resources.
For more information, please visit TheVRFund.com, like The VR Fund on Facebook and follow on LinkedIn and Twitter.
