Samsung, Google and Qualcomm have announced an alliance to create a new mixed reality platform that’s sure to challenge Apple’s expected push into the same realm.
Samsung closed its Unpacked launch event on Monday by bringing top Qualcomm and Google executives on stage to hint at the “extended reality” products to come.
The word – which was later confirmed by Samsung post-event – was of a Samsung-made headset, running on Android and powered by the Snapdragon chips optimised for to Samsung Galaxy hardware. While no products were revealed during the event, it was clear the three companies aren’t planning to leave the playing field to the Apple.
You can see the segment of the presentation timestamped below:
Apple is set to announce its own entry into the mixed reality hardware market within the next few months, and this was an opportunity for Samsung boss TM Roh (along with Qualcomm’s CEO Cristiano Amon, and Google’s SVP of Android Hiroshi Lockheimer) to let people know the answer is coming.
Of course, in some manner, the three companies teamed up to bring users VR experiences through Samsung’s Gear VR headsets, which leveraged the company’s Galaxy phones that were powered by Android and Qualcomm.
“Many different companies … have been making these announcements about different realities,” Samsung’s president TM Roh told the Washington Post. “So we have also been making similar preparations, no less than any others.”
“We’re getting there, but we’re not too far away,” he added. “For the chipset, it is going to be a strategic collaboration with Qualcomm. The hardware will be us. For the ecosystem, we were trying to determine which platform to work with. And in the end, we decided that it was going to be Google.”
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