Google Inc is making a big bet on augmented reality, leading a US$542 million investment in a shadowy startup called Magic Leap Inc, based in Dania Beach, Florida.
The investment, one of the largest ever made by Google, values Magic Leap at about US$2 billion, according to people briefed on the matter, but not authorized to discuss the deal publicly. Other investors in the round include Qualcomm Ventures, Legendary Entertainment, private equity firm KKR, Vulcan Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Andreessen Horowitz and Obvious Ventures.
Google’s role as the lead investor is significant. Just seven months ago, Facebook Inc stunned Silicon Valley with a US$2 billion acquisition of Oculus VR Inc, a virtual reality company. Facebook believes that Oculus can be a new sort of operating system as people continue to find new ways to interact with computers.
Google views Magic Leap in much the same way, according to people briefed on the company’s thinking. As people become more comfortable with wearable technology, technologies like Magic Leap — which superimposes animated digital imagery over what someone sees with the naked eye — is likely to become more commonplace.
Already, Google makes a similar technology on its own, Google Glass. Though nascent, Google Glass has attracted enthusiastic early adopters, who use the glasses — which have small computer displays embedded in the lenses — to do simple tasks like search the Internet, take photographs and send messages.
Magic Leap has broader ambitions. On its Web site, the little-known company outlines an ambitious vision for displaying rich interactive graphics alongside what people see naturally, using what it calls a “dynamic digitized lightfield signal.”
“Magic Leap is an eclectic group of visionaries, rocket scientists, wizards and gurus from the fields of film, robotics, visualization, software, computing and user experience,” the company says on its Web site.
As part of the deal, Sundar Pichai, Google’s senior vice president of Android, Chrome and Apps, will join the Magic Leap board.
“We are looking forward to Magic Leap’s next stage of growth, and to seeing how it will shape the future of visual computing,” Pichai said.
Qualcomm executive chairman Paul Jacobs and Google vice president of corporate development Don Harrison are to take observer roles on the board.
“We are excited and honored to have such an extraordinary group of investors to help us bring our vision and products to the world,” Magic Leap chief executive Rony Abovitz said.
“Magic Leap is going beyond the current perception of mobile computing, augmented reality and virtual reality. We are transcending all three and will revolutionize the way people communicate, purchase, learn, share and play,” Abovitz added.
Napoleon Osorio is proud of being the first taxi driver to have accepted payment in bitcoin in the first country in the world to make the cryptocurrency legal tender: El Salvador. He credits Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele’s decision to bank on bitcoin three years ago with changing his life. “Before I was unemployed... And now I have my own business,” said the 39-year-old businessman, who uses an app to charge for rides in bitcoin and now runs his own car rental company. Three years ago the leader of the Central American nation took a huge gamble when he put bitcoin
TECH RACE: The Chinese firm showed off its new Mate XT hours after the latest iPhone launch, but its price tag and limited supply could be drawbacks China’s Huawei Technologies Co (華為) yesterday unveiled the world’s first tri-foldable phone, as it seeks to expand its lead in the world’s biggest smartphone market and steal the spotlight from Apple Inc hours after it debuted a new iPhone. The Chinese tech giant showed off its new Mate XT, which users can fold three ways like an accordion screen door, during a launch ceremony in Shenzhen. The Mate XT comes in red and black and has a 10.2-inch display screen. At 3.6mm thick, it is the world’s slimmest foldable smartphone, Huawei said. The company’s Web site showed that it has garnered more than
Demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips should spur growth for the semiconductor industry over the next few years, the CEO of a major supplier to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) said, dismissing concerns that investors had misjudged the pace and extent of spending on AI. While the global chip market has grown about 8 percent annually over the past 20 years, AI semiconductors should grow at a much higher rate going forward, Scientech Corp (辛耘) chief executive officer Hsu Ming-chi (許明琪) told Bloomberg Television. “This booming of the AI industry has just begun,” Hsu said. “For the most prominent
PARTNERSHIPS: TSMC said it has been working with multiple memorychip makers for more than two years to provide a full spectrum of solutions to address AI demand Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said it has been collaborating with multiple memorychip makers in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) used in artificial intelligence (AI) applications for more than two years, refuting South Korean media report's about an unprecedented partnership with Samsung Electronics Co. As Samsung is competing with TSMC for a bigger foundry business, any cooperation between the two technology heavyweights would catch the eyes of investors and experts in the semiconductor industry. “We have been working with memory partners, including Micron, Samsung Memory and SK Hynix, on HBM solutions for more than two years, aiming to advance 3D integrated circuit
RSS