During a press conference at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Qualcomm Chief Executive Cristiano Amon said that the two companies will work together to design the custom chips alongside the software that developers need to create virtual worlds in which people can work and play.
AR functionality
Amon said that the devices created as a result of the collaboration will work with Microsoft’s Mesh software, allowing users to beam a realistic likeness of themselves into the headset of another user, allowing them to inhabit the same virtual room.
Future hardware will also use Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Spaces software that helps perform basic augmented reality functions such as mapping out physical spaces so that digital objects can be overlaid on them and hand-tracking so that users can manipulate digital objects with hand gestures.
Future possibilities
“We’ve been talking for years about the possibility of having wearable augmented reality devices that will gain scale,” Amon, one of the few major tech executives not to cancel his physical presence at the trade show, said from a live-streamed talk on stage in Las Vegas.
The two companies did not give details on availability for either the chips or headsets.
“Our goal is to inspire and empower others to collectively work to develop the metaverse future – a future that is grounded in trust and innovation,” Rubén Caballero, corporate vice president for mixed reality at Microsoft, said in a statement.
CES 2022 was cut short by one day as COVID-19 cases surge in the United States.
