China Daily Global Edition (USA)
From real virus to virtual turnaround, quickly
The COVID-19 outbreak catalyzes digital transition, revives flagging technologies
VR is a technology that has the potential to fundamentally transform our lives, and 2021 will be the year people will look back on as the year it really started to take off.”
Alvin Graylin Wang, president of HTC China
The fifth-generation wireless technology is becoming a big enabler of virtual reality and augmented reality industries, as 5G opens new possibilities by providing high bandwidth, low lag times and massively collaborative on-demand contextualized experiences, company executives and industry observers said.
Their comments reflect the fact that VR and AR applications have become an improbable key engine for digital transformation amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
And now, companies are scrambling to promote the use of AR and VR in sectors like education, social networking and gaming.
International Data Corp, a market research company, forecast that worldwide spending on AR and VR will accelerate in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, growing from just over $12 billion in 2020 to $72.8 billion in 2024 — a staggering 507 percent lunge over a four-year period.
Specifically, the spending on AR and VR in the Asia-Pacific region will reach $28.8 billion by 2024, and the China market represents the largest AR/VR spending in the AsiaPacific region — with more than 90 percent share in 2020, IDC said.
Deepan Pathy, research manager of Future of Work, AR/VR and Mobility research at IDC’s Asia-Pacific region, said: “With customer and employee engagement gaining prominence, spending intent on AR/VR is rapidly accelerating. Organizations need to develop a vision and devise a resilient strategy for deploying AR/VR as enabling tools to achieve strategic priorities.”
IDC said 2020 is now seen as a major turning point where enterprises and organizations across all verticals decided to embrace the unarticulated need for augmented, mixed and virtual reality.
During the pandemic, AR/VR showed great potential and played a critical role in digital transformation efforts of many organizations across industries.
When doctors used mixed reality technology to solve several medical problems during the ongoing pandemic, their super specialized field at the intersection of healthcare and AR/VR technology became an instant focus area of investments. In addition, remote working, virtual events, and more augmented customer engagement use cases will generate demand for implementing AR/VR technology in the future, IDC said.
As organizations return to workplace strategies, ensuring a safe workplace for employees is a top-ofthe-agenda item for business leaders — and creating a contactless or touch-free workplace environment will be crucial.
AR/VR will be a key enabler in creating a workplace that can minimize person-to-person interaction. And initiatives like virtual conferences, remote support, remote device management, and AR-aided retail shopping will hold the key to the future, IDC said.
IDC forecast that spending in VR solutions will be greater than that of AR solutions initially. But, strong growth in AR hardware, software and services spending will push overall AR spending well ahead of VR spending by the end of 2024.
Yuan Min, deputy general manager of Migu Video, a subsidiary of Chinese digital content provider Migu, said VR is a major 5G-powered application and is closely linked to the development of 5G. As China accelerates efforts to roll out 5G, VR is also expected to see faster expansion.
“We will pour in more resources to assist the production of highquality VR content because the commercialization of 5G will fuel the industry’s growth,” Yuan said.
She also said 5G can solve many of the technological bottlenecks that have limited the popularity of VR and AR, such as enabling new convenient forms of meetings to reduce misunderstandings and better convey messages.
Migu said its Cloud VR platform has already played an active part in offering rich content to consumers amid the COVID-19 pandemic. For instance, it has enabled consumers to see 360-degree online livestreams of Qomolangma, known in the West as Mount Everest, and support VR concerts.
Yuan said the platform is currently dedicated to helping consumers access VR content on smartphones, TVs and VR goggles, so more people will learn about the format and enjoy its beauty.
As the price of VR hardware falls and content becomes increasingly abundant and diverse, more people will buy and embrace professional VR goggles, Yuan said.
Tuong Nguyen, senior principal analyst at research firm Gartner, said earlier that high-quality VR will become possible in places where 5G is available because the technology will enhance the sense of “presence”, the feeling that consumers are really “there” inside the experience.
5G’s higher speeds better enable real-time rendering for immersive video, shorter download and reduced latency to boost the experience of VR and AR, Gartner said.
Riding on the technological advancements of 5G, HTC Corp, a global leader in VR technologies, unveiled its latest premium virtual reality headsets in May as it seeks to set a new benchmark for business and consumer VR, bringing 5K resolution and a 120-degree field of view as standard for the sector.
The move fits in nicely with HTC’s bigger game plan to improve its VR hardware and software capabilities to expand the popularity of its products among consumers and businesses. It also coincides with expectations that VR will likely see faster growth and intensified competition in the 5G era.
Alvin Graylin Wang, president of HTC China, said, “VR is a technology that has the potential to fundamentally transform our lives, and 2021 will be the year people will look back on as the year it really started to take off.”
One of the new VR headsets HTC unveiled is the Vive Focus 3. HTC said the Vive Focus 3 will redefine all-in-one VR with no compromises, while the other, the Vive Pro 2, pushes the boundaries of PC VR for gaming, designing and experiences.
“The products and services we announced are the key catalysts that will ignite the VR revolution by setting a new standard for what quality VR should have,” he said.
HTC said having a single device that can be used as a stand-alone unit, connect with a PC or 5G cloud VR network, comfortably worn for many hours, while delivering a new level of clarity that can not only take consumers to another world but replace their daily monitors ... well, such a device will likely lead to accelerated adoption of VR in the near future.
Industry insiders are confident about AR’s commercial prospects. Bob Cai, chief marketing officer of the carrier business group at Huawei Technologies Co, said 5G and AR may be symbiotic — 5G makes use of AR and AR enables 5G. AR can truly enable the convergence of the physical and digital worlds, and it will see massive adoption in five prioritized industries: education, social networking, shopping, travel and navigation. Besides, gaming will benefit big time.
Cai said the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated digital transformation and prompted more enterprises to embrace AR technologies. Huawei is making use of AR to demonstrate its leading products and solutions online, to make communication far more efficient during and after the pandemic.
Huawei is also using AR to achieve the quick delivery of 5G base stations, greatly boosting delivery efficiency, Cai said.
Huawei said in its AR Insight and Application Practice White Paper that at present, due to the high price of professional AR headsets, it is difficult to popularize them in the consumer market, but they have already played their part in the medical, manufacturing and logistics industries, as professional AR equipment can free hands and create value in many work scenarios.
The white paper forecast that with technological advancements, AR headsets will become more popular in the consumer market. By 2026, products under $500 will dominate the sector and see explosive growth. At the same time, consumer AR headset shipments are forecast to exceed 53 million units.
He Chengjian, director of the Shenzhen Municipal Communication Management Bureau, said information communication technology services represented by AR can potentially be adopted across a wide range of industries, including industrial production, e-commerce, real estate, home decor, culture, sports, tourism, healthcare and education.
“AR applications have become a key engine for digital transformation and will profoundly change production methods and how we live,” He said.