All of applied science works the same way. It’s a theory until its manufacturing becomes commercially viable. After that we see a hoard of corporate giants pumping billions of dollars into the idea to gain and expand their consumer base. It happened with the PC, portable music players, and smartphones. Now, it’s happening to Virtual Reality (VR).
The market leader in virtual reality currently is Oculus VR. The Oculus Rift is already established as a high-end product. And with a market that’s far from saturation, the big tech giants are vying for a lion’s share of future profits. So the question we are asking is this: Can we expect a virtual reality product from Apple?
The answer: Quite possible.
Our biggest clue is from Tim Cook himself. Usually when any senior VP at Apple is asked about a product that is yet to come out, or an industry they are yet to venture into, we don’t expect a straight answer. It has always been like that at Apple: things are all hush hush and top secret.
Not this time, though. When asked if he considers virtual reality a niche, Tim Cook said this: “I don’t think it’s a niche. It’s really cool. It has some interesting applications.”
That statement puts him at par with names like Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page and Satya Nadella, who all agree, unanimously, that virtual reality is here to stay. All of them have been quite vocal about it also. Only Apple was missing from the list of tech mammoths who didn’t publicly embrace VR.
Now that has changed. Apple has already shown interest in expanding rapidly into other tech areas (like automobile) and we shouldn’t be totally surprised if it makes a splash in the VR pool as well.
If Apple wants to enter this industry, it should do so sooner rather than later, because the other players already have a head-start. Samsung, for example, has launched the Samsung Gear VR headset, which was developed in coalition with Facebook!
Similarly, HTC has the Vive, and Sony has the PlayStation VR, all of which will be releasing soon. Microsoft is arguably ahead of the curve, already pushing its HoloLens hard, backed by a loyal user base of the Xbox.
Clues that Apple is working on the technology have been steadily piling up. It seems even more likely now that Cook has publicly declared his interest. So we are hoping that in this year’s WWDC, Apple shows us a glimpse of iVR. Now wouldn’t that be something really spectacular? And if something like that happens, you can be sure that we’ll keep you posted!
