Welcome to the 4th episode, prepared for you as a podcast, where I compile the developments in the virtual reality industry that caught my eye over the past week.

  • (1) Varjo, which produces VR/AR headsets for enterprises, received a $54 million Series-C investment . With this investment, it has secured a total of $100 million in funding.
  • (2) Alcove, a virtual home application for VR headsets, is coming to Oculus Quest on August 20.
  • (3) The new lobby and social interaction update coming to Oculus Venues has sparked excitement among those waiting for Facebook Horizon.
  • (4) The new music pack eagerly awaited by Beat Saber fans has been announced . With 11 of its songs, Linkin Park is now in Beat Saber.
  • (5) Starting from October, a Facebook account will be required for first-time users of Oculus VR headsets. In 2023, it will be required for everyone.
  • (6) It will be possible to use the same Oculus VR headset with different Facebook accounts.
  • (7) It was revealed that Apple has received a patent for detecting physical boundaries for VR headsets.

Podcast: TBA

(1) Founded in Finland in 2016, Varjo , a company that produces VR and AR headsets for enterprises, received a $54 million Series-C investment . With this fund, it has received a total of $100 million in investment since its inception. The company announced that this funding, provided by venture groups such as Volvo, Tesi, and NordicNinja, will be used to develop industry-leading hardware and software products faster and to increase its global market share. Along with the provided financing, there were also some changes in the company’s management. The company’s CEO, Timo Toikkanen, will continue to serve as CEO. Former CEO and co-founder Niko Eiden will serve as a board member and CXO. The company’s new CEO stated in a press release: ‘While a large part of the world continues to work remotely, we see a tremendous demand for virtual and mixed reality use cases’, indicating that business is going quite well, and added, ‘With the support of our growing investor group, we look forward to scaling operations and delivering the cutting-edge technology clients need to transform the way they work.’

Meanwhile, it is worth mentioning that Varjo works with large-scale companies such as Boeing, Volvo, Siemens, and Audi. Aiming to offer high-quality mixed reality headsets with retina-quality displays, the company seems poised to shift into high gear with this investment.

(2) While the well-known pandemic has forced some families around the world to stay in separate places due to mandatory quarantines, it has caused others to spend more time together at home. If you complain about the lack of common time spent with your loved ones or family in real life, I will talk about an application that you might like. With the application called Alcove , it is possible to be together with your loved ones in a virtual home and make virtual shares together. You can pet animals, share photos, listen to music, watch videos, play chess, and visit different places around the world with 360-degree images. Previously released for Oculus Go, the application will take its place in the Oculus Quest store on August 20. We will see together how much interest this free application will attract.

(3) The next news is about Facebook Horizon , which is the VR version of social media that was introduced last year and said to be released in 2020. Actually, Oculus’s application called ‘Venues’ received an update. In this update, having avatars and a lobby, just like in last year’s FB Horizon promotional video, was enough to create excitement. The Oculus Venues application, released in 2018, allows socializing in the virtual reality world by discovering new events on a specific schedule. The introduction of avatars in the new ‘Venues’ application, which is currently open to a limited number of users, can be thought of as a preview of the highly anticipated Horizon. The release date for Facebook Horizon is not yet known, but while there are talks about the introduction of the Oculus Quest 2 in September, we might encounter a surprise. Social platforms already exist on VR platforms. However, the evolution of a company with more than 2 billion users using new technologies will undoubtedly affect other social media platforms as well.

(4) Beat Saber, the game of slashing boxes with a lightsaber to rhythmic songs, announced its most sensational music pack to date. This time, Linkin Park will accompany the visual feast with 11 songs to slash boxes in the VR world. The price of the music pack is $14. But first, you need to buy the Beat Saber game for $30. Along with the pack, the game, which adds new environments and lighting visual features, aims to satisfy users both audibly and visually. For now, we can only follow the music pack, released for Oculus Quest and Rift, from videos.

Linkin Park’s Songs Added to Beat Saber:

  • Bleed It Out
  • Breaking the Habit
  • Faint
  • Given Up
  • In The End
  • New Divide
  • Numb
  • One Step Closer
  • Papercut
  • Somewhere I Belong
  • What I’ve Done

(5) With the post published on the Oculus blog on August 18, new social features were announced. As of right now, virtual reality headsets that can be used only with an Oculus ID without a Facebook account will require a Facebook account starting from October for first-time account creators. In other words, if you are going to buy an Oculus headset, it will be mandatory to have a Facebook account. Existing users who want to use it without a Facebook account have been given until January 1, 2023. If they do not connect their Oculus account to Facebook by this date, they will be able to continue using their VR headsets with limited features.

(6) The next news is a continuation of the previous one. Oculus headsets could only be paired with one account, and there was no option for someone else to log in with their own account when using it. Along with the decision to merge Oculus and Facebook accounts, it was also announced that the ability for multiple people to log into VR headsets will be introduced. Thus, it will be possible for different people to personalize games and applications on the same headset. The feature, whose release date is currently unknown, seems likely to be announced at the launch event in September.

(7) Although there is no explanation from the Apple side regarding virtual reality, no one in the sector doubts that they will release VR glasses soon. Job postings it published, the companies it acquired, and finally, the appearance of the patent file it applied for on ‘detecting physical boundaries’ point to this. According to the published patent application, the physical distance detection system works in two stages. In the first stage, a warning sign appears when approaching a place where the user should not go. If the boundary is crossed, a visual representation of the environment they are in is projected directly into the user’s eye. This is similar to Oculus’s ‘Pass Through’ system.

That’s all for this week’s virtual reality agenda. You can also follow my blog on Twitter, Instagram, and Telegram accounts to be informed about daily developments without waiting for a week. You can comment for questions, suggestions, and anything else, and if you like it, you can subscribe via the YouTube channel or the podcast application you use.

See you in the next episode…

Stay healthy…