Top 10 Companies Leading the AR/VR Revolutions, 2020 September 2020

VOL 09 | ISSUE 07 | 2020 THE NEW REALITY WHY WITHIN HAS BECOME A SIGNIFICANT NAME

Company of The Year

10 T O P

Ken Ehrhart Founder & CEO

COMPANIES LEADING THE

R REVOLUTION 2020

THE NEW REALITY HOW SNAP INC. IS CARVING ITS NAME IN THE XR SPACE

Editor’s Desk

A New World to Experience

Erasing the line between Reality and Virtuality

Since 1956, VR is constantly gaining progress, but the prominent change was seen when in 2014 Facebook bought Oculus a well-known VR company. It was the changing moment for VR industry where multiple industries had started to look into VR’s actual potential.

Past few years was a growth years for virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR). These technologies has narrowed the line between reality and virtuality and collectively known as extended reality (XR). The emergence of these technologies first began to be felt from the arenas of gaming and entertainment, where they first started to become popular.

Most people's first interaction with VR and AR today is likely to be in entertainment and gaming. This situation is about to change, as studies shows that the development of enterprise XR solutions is passing to consumer solutions. According to ‘The 2020 XR Industry Insight’ reports collated from VR Intelligence states that 65% of the AR companies surveyed showed that these companies are working on industrial applications, whereas just 37% working on software and consumer products.

So, in this edition, “Top 10 Companies Leading the AR/VR Revolutions, 2020” Insights Success has shortlisted prominent AR/VR services/solution providers which are enhancing the viewing experience with their advance and innovative AR/VR solutions.

The company of the year features Paracosma Inc, an AR and VR design, consulting and systems integration company that provides solutions and skills to both small and large customers. The company believes that Paracosma is one of the larger pure-play AR/VR startups. There is a paradigm shift taking place in computer technology from 2D systems to 3D systems. And the company rapidly embraced Augmented Reality as well a year later with the release of Apple’s ARKit and Google’s ARCore. Over the last four years, in addition to VR and AR application development, its 3D modeling team has dramatically expanded. This gives it exceptional capability as 3D content creators, in such diverse areas as photography replacement and Digital Twin creation.

Also, while flipping the pages, don’t forget to go through the articles and CXOs written by our inhouse editorial team and industry experts respectively.

Rohit Chaturvedi

ARTICLES

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The New Reality

The New Reality

Why Within has become a SigniďŹ cant Name

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How Snap Inc. is Carving its Name in the XR Space

16 Paracosma

Augview

Helping Organizations to be Agile

COMPANY OF THE YEAR

Making Virtual Reality Better than Reality

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18 Bitsens Boosting Digital Image Since Inception

28 CleverBooks An Incredible Way to Make Study Come Alive

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Digital Artflow

Snaappy

Enhancing Visual Experience through Multiple Realities

Making Visual Communication More Approchable

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East City Films

Kagiso Interactive RSA

Immersing Audiences in Important Stories

38 My Basic LLC: Minority-Owned Business Strives to Help Businesses Grow With VR and Digital Marketing

Improving Business Practices by Using AR/VR

50 VR Vision Inc. Delivering Unparalleled Virtual World Experience

Editor-in-Chief Sumita Sarkar Managing Editor Anish Miller

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Andy Mitter

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COMPANY OF THE YEAR

Ken Ehrhart Founder & CEO

Top

COMPANIES Leading the

Revolutions, 2020

Making Virtual Reality Better than Reality

T

hrough Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR), one can experience realities that are rare (fleeting or remote), impractical (dangerous or expensive), impossible (past or future); or otherwise enable people to experience things (emotion or empathy) from a different perspective (identity or scale).

With headquarters in San Francisco and offices in Japan and Nepal, Paracosma Inc is an AR and VR design, consulting and systems integration company that provides solutions and skills to both small and large customers.

In an interview with Insights Success, Ken Ehrhart, the Founder & CEO of Paracosma shared a few key insights and struggles, which eventually helped the organizations to reach new heights.

Below are the highlights of the interview between Insights Success and Ken Ehrhart; What led to the inception of the company?

There is a paradigm shift taking place in computer technology from 2D systems to 3D systems. Paracosma is focused on the opportunities arising from this transition.

Paracosma was founded as a Virtual Reality service provider at the start of 2016, when the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive VR headsets launched. We rapidly embraced Augmented Reality as well a year later with the release of Apple’s ARKit and Google’s ARCore. Over the last four years, in addition to VR and AR application development, our 3D modeling team has dramatically expanded. This gives us exceptional capability as 3D content creators, in such diverse areas as photography replacement and Digital Twin creation.

Describe Paracosma’s innovative VR and AR solutions which address all the various needs of its customers.

Paracosma is one of the larger pure-play AR/VR startups.

We now have over 75 employees including 45 artists and 30 AR/VR developers and engineers. This breath of expertise is really critical in allowing us to provide a one-stop shop for our clients across many sectors.

For AARP, we are producing VR brain games to improve aging users’ mental fitness. For UrsaLeo, we make Digital Twins to visualize Internet of Things data overlaid on client facilities. We developed a library of holographic video content that can be viewed in AR or VR for business simulation training by an HR and Talent Management company. For IVN, we built a demo of live point-cloudbased 3D video communications. We have a manufacturing client using AR for machine maintenance to reduce

downtime and improve efficiency. Medical clients using VR laparoscopic surgery training to save lives. Oil and gas clients using VR training to prevent spills and fires. An online retailer is replacing expensive studio photography with digital renderings of our photorealistic 3D models.

In this time of Covid19 lockdowns, we are creating realistic virtual copies of real offices and corporate facilities, and turning those Digital Twins into fully interactive, multiuser VR environments that can be used for virtual face-to-face remote meetings, for company presentations and large group events, or for real-time collaboration and training. We are also giving away our consumer VR sandbox game, Shelter in Place, in which players find themselves within a large mansion filled with minigames and entertainment.

How is the company’s VR solution more advanced compared to other companies’ solutions?

At our core, we are a Solutions Provider. We provide bespoke solutions not a least-common-denominator off-theshelf product. We help our clients by creating custom solutions to realize the specific results they are looking for.

We are not trying to force the sale of a one-size-fits-all generic product, which is unfortunately sometimes the goal of smaller companies that may struggle if they don’t standardize on a general-purpose offering. Because we have scale and longevity, we can be more innovative and pursue cutting edge research that better meets the forward-looking visions of our clients.

As Founder and CEO of the company, how does your background influence the company and your approach to the industry?

At Paracosma we are focused on creating and delivering world-class business-to-business solutions to some of the largest global companies. As a Venture Capitalist for 20 years, I have experience guiding startup companies to successful global growth. My focus on establishing the Japan subsidiaries for multi-billion-dollar Enterprise SAAS companies (like Concur, Marketo and Demandware) provides over a decade of experience serving the business needs of large enterprise clients. It is somewhat rare to be able to bridge between the worlds of small high-growth startups and more conservative and demanding large enterprise clients. I believe my background contributes to our ability to successfully do just that.

Describe in detail about the work culture and the values that drives the company.

The current pandemic lockdowns lay bare the truth that companies are only as strong as their employees. Offices,

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facilities, and workstations stand empty and unused, while the capabilities, creativity and dedication of individual employees remain crucial. As a Service Provider, Paracosma’s quality and capacity is a direct reflection of the experience and ingenuity of our employee teams.

Therefore, we put our employees first, and during these difficult times, we have maintained full employment. In fact, we are continuing to expand our client services. This is only possible because of our people.

Which technologies are bringing disruption in AR/VR industry?

Over the last few years, AR and VR have seen steady adoption and expansion from consumer to enterprise and industrial applications. In areas such as medical training and oil and gas handling, in which mistakes can cost lives, risk-free VR training is the ultimate solution. This year, with the pandemic lockdowns, we have begun to realize the greatest potential of these technologies. The fundamental goal of VR is to create virtual worlds as vibrant, interactive and useful as the real world, which has been closed off.

Through multiuser VR we can recreate offices, meetings, tradeshows, concerts, entertainment, retail, education, travel and other social experiences that are currently restricted in real life. This provides the greatest opportunity that we have yet seen for the expansion of the VR market. We believe we are seeing an inflection point in the industry that was facilitated by high-quality, low-cost, stand-alone VR headsets like the Oculus Quest.

How is Paracosma contributing to the evolution of the AR/VR industry?

Paracosma’s goal has always been to expand the availability and adoption of AR and VR through the offering of highquality, low-cost solutions. As a direct response to the Coronavirus Pandemic, Paracosma has been offering both consumers and businesses free VR solutions as a community service. In addition to offered “Shelter in Place”, our consumer VR game, for free to players, we have also been giving away free virtual offices to companies that want to try out remote VR collaboration. Surveys have shown that once companies try and begin using AR and VR they continue to invest in and expand that use. We believe that now is the best time for companies and individuals to experience what VR and AR have to offer, to improve their businesses and lives. Those positive experiences will continue to expand the industry.

What technologies is the company leveraging to make its solutions resourceful?

To offer the most scalable, affordable solution for VR collaboration, Paracosma has been building VR Worlds on top of Microsoft’s free Altspace VR platform. This enables companies and their employees to very quickly realize the benefits of real-time multiuser collaboration in their own virtual offices and auditoriums at just the price of the users’ VR headsets, or even at no extra cost when accessed through a standard PC. What are the company’s future aspirations? What strategies is it undertaking to achieve those goals?

We are working with several clients and partners on longterm projects and collaborations that absorb almost all our capacity as fast as we can increase it. So, we continue to hire and train team members as rapidly as possible. This is of course complicated during the current crisis. But, as a global organization with operations in the US, Japan and Nepal, we have of necessity fully embraced the use of virtual office environments and remote virtual operations.

We have ourselves become a test subject and now a case study in adoption of remote collaboration in VR, with daily meetings and frequent all-company presentations. The technology works great and is helping us accelerate our growth and productivity. Our goal is to share that message as broadly as possible and help other enterprises realize the same benefits.

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VOL 07 | ISSUE 05 | 2020

EXPERT’S ADVICE THE GLASS CEILING EFFECT: ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE ON WOMEN AND LEADERSHIP

WOMEN IMPOWER DYNAMICS OF WOMEN PARTICIPATION IN THE EVER-CHANGING MODERN WORKFORCE

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Choose E xc e l l e n t, Choose Insights

Top 10 Companies Leading the AR/VR Revolutions, 2020

16 | September 2020

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Top 10 Companies Leading the ARVR Revolutions, 2020

Boosting Digital Image Since Inception

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M

otivated by challenges, supercharged by hard work, Vilnius, Lithuania based Bitsens came into existence to boost its client's digital presence. The company features a hi-end cross-cultural team with data-driven approach and creative mindset that helped numerous clients from 23 countries grow their businesses. The organization's portfolio features awardwinning solutions in all major business niches.

In an interview with Insights Success, the spokesperson of Bitsens has shared important insights about the company and its road to success.

Below are the highlights of the interview; What led to the inception of the company?

Two motivated and passionate men once made a decision that changed their lives. They took a risk to start their own business with no investment put into it. One of them has extensive expertise and advanced knowledge in advertisement and media production ďŹ elds while another possesses a solid background in IT development. They strongly believed in future success as their analytical and technical skills fairly exceeded the market competitors had at that time. Finally, it came up trumps. Here is why Bitsens has already existed for more than 8 years providing clients with the best design and technical solutions for their projects.

Vadim Khadakou founder Bitsens

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‘‘

We believe that every product launch is exclusive. However, some repetitions appear in the lunch process. If you can identify them and learn, every new product release will be more successful and efcient.

Describe your company and its cutting-edge AR/VR services which address all the needs of your customers.

We are setting ourselves up as a creative digital agency. Our services are placed at the junction of creativity and innovative digital technologies. No doubt, AR and VR directions perfectly represent it. To tell the truth, for the last few years we've completed numerous projects in AR/VR fields and our intense work resulted in a massive and diverse portfolio of projects from various industries (game, media, tourism, etc.). It's safe to bet that we've tried each and every framework, engine, and technology to make our AR/VR products stand out.

Could you throw some light on your mission and vision statement?

Bitsens's core values include perfectionism, hard work and analytical thinking. We're hell-bent on delivering the best products we can in a digital-led world. Upon our values, we carry out all the preparation and production works to deliver outstanding results to the clients. “Digital perfection in every bit” is what unites and defines us as a team.

How does your AR/VR services unique from the other companies' offerings?

To ensure we provide clean and flawless products to our

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clients, our AR/VR department consists only of senior developers with years of experience in the field. Moreover, in comparison to one-dimensional AR/VR studios, we've compelled a strong team of interface designers who can join such kinds of projects to enhance the workflow of any application created. We believe it's a great advantage that makes our offerings in AR/VR unique.

Give a detailed description of the featured person's influence over the company and the industry.

Vadim Khadakou is the founder of Bitsens. Before establishing his own business, he had a chance to work in a few advertising agencies and become an Art Director in a big toys/game company. Growing up as a professional, Vadim has obtained vast experience and multiple skills essential to working on web, mobile, interface, and startup projects. An influencer, entrepreneur and startup advisor, Vadim is highly committed to his team and people he is working with. Bitsens's team under Vadim's supervision has already collaborated with companies such as UEFA, Nestle, DDB, Wargaming, IBM Israel, Toronto University, and Pavia University.

How is AR/VR technology disrupting the entertainment and gaming industry?

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Despite the statement sounds like a persuasive one, we slightly disagree upon it. From our point of view, AR/VR technology enhances and makes entertainment and gaming industries more efficient rather than become a big troublemaker there. No doubt, the implementation of these technologies still requires a lot of effort, time and certain expenses. For instance, a user needs a helmet for VR while AR applications require an ARKit or ARCore frameworks to be able to work with this technology. Nevertheless, we see it more as a temporary difficulty than a blocker on its way.

What technologies are you leveraging to make your services resourceful?

To provide excellent services we always keep up with the latest technologies which can improve our work. Thus, for the design needs we use such applications like Zeplin, Invision, and Miro. Moreover, we use special groupware technologies for a better information structuring which help us to reach the most effective project performance.

However, we understand that some of our clients might be unfamiliar or feel uncomfortable following up on the projects using unknown tools. That's why, being agile and easily adaptive, our team is always ready to move and work in suggested workgroup support systems.

What are your company's future aspirations? What strategies are you undertaking to achieve those goals?

Bitsens has grown up from a service company offering web,

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mobile & interface development and branding to a creative digital consulting agency. However, over the past several years our expertise in certain fields has been dramatically improved and widened to let us move on to the next step becoming a product company. Thus, recently we've launched two highly successful mobile applications: Heart Rate - Track Your Pulse and Day Tracker. Count Up & Down. Analyzing its strong performance, we're aiming to continue releasing new products under Bitsens's benchmark.

Give us a few testimonials of your clients that accurately highlight your company's position in the market Flexibility is Bitsens's main strength. Because our environment is constantly changing, they're always prepared to modify the plan even if we haven't discussed it during the initial stages. The team adapts their processes to fit our design and development needs. I'm particularly impressed with their design and frontend capabilities. Head of Production, Play2Live When there were issues, they were diligent about finding the root cause of them. I appreciate their direct communication, consciousness of our budget, and positive attitudes. They were extremely reactive and got things done. All in all, I've never doubted our decision to hire them. In fact, I've recommended them to others because of their awesome, professional work. - Managing Partner, EVOCEAN

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The New Reality

Within has become a

Why

SIGNIFICANT NAME

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W

hat lies within can be brought out to the world in all its colors, shades, ideas, and themes…if only one knows how best to make use of technology, more specifically AR and VR. And it is precisely here, that Within’s repertoire finds it widest amplitude. Where it can be and needs to be expressed with the help of the latest and best in AR and VR, they have the wherewithal and creative folks to do the needful, every time!

Founded in 2014 in LA, it was called Vrse at inception with founders, Chris Milk and Aaron Koblin being the erstwhile part of Google’s Data Arts team. From the onset, the founders had their ideas set on communicating to the world at large using premium AR, VR and XR experiences, across mediums be it the web, the mobile phones, tablets, computers, or consoles.

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With headsets being an important element in the world of immersive AR and VR, Within’s VR app supports major headsets, including Oculus Rift, Oculus Quest, Samsung Gear VR, HTC Vive, Sony PlayStation VR, and Google Daydream. To facilitate wider reach, Within is available on a variety of platforms including Oculus Store, iOS App Store, Steam, and Google Play while remaining compatible to iOS and Android OS as also HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and Quest, Google Cardboard and Samsung Gear VR. Into the present, Within remains a pioneer in creating, acquiring and distributing top-of-the line AR and VR besides XR experiences across platforms and gadgets and was named by FastCompany as one of the most innovative entities in this space for its child-specific app, the Wonderscope, an AR-assisted feature encourages children and young people to read. In fact, taking their ideas the logical way, the company is also said to be in the process of

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releasing a fitness training app with extensive use of its AR and VR platforms.

What truly marks Within as being distinct from others is that it uses all its energies and resources into making its features stand out while using a mix of reality burnished with VR and AR. Take for instance the “Vice News VR” about the Million March that took place in New York in the year 1995. Through the footage of an insider in the march digitally enhanced using AR, it brings to life the palpable feelings of the marchers, their anguish, hope and feeling of disgust. Had it not been for the augmentation brought about by the software, creating the same and seamlessly adding it to the main theme could have taken enormous time and resources.

Within’s repertoire is not limited to serious stuff. In fact, a sizable quantity of the content delves with things as diverse as music, documentary, horror and experimental, all of which go to show the power of VR to augment the production of features which would otherwise be difficult, if not impossible for a variety of reasons including expenses, and which would never-the-less be no match for AR in terms of quality of the final output.

What is also interesting today about Within is its ownership.

It is in parts held by the likes of Andreessen Horowitz, Annapurna Pictures Temasek, Live Nation, Emerson Collective, Raine Ventures, WME, Vice Media, 21st

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Century Fox, Legendary Pictures, and Tribeca Enterprises.

As per information updated on Wikipedia, Within’s work has had their share of recognition and appreciation. It has been named the #1 VR app for iOS by Apple Insider, the “Best New App” on iTunes and is the most downloaded and highest rated cinematic VR app for Google Cardboard.

Within’s VR films found their way to the Tribeca Film Festival and for the Sundance Film Festival of 2015 and 2016.

“The Displaced” won the Most Next Award at 2016’s AICP Awards and the 2016 Cannes Lions Grand Prix in the Entertainment category. Founder Chris Milk’s SNL40 VR won the Best Online Film & Video Award of the 2016 Webby Awards. Besides, “Clouds Over Sidra” won the Interactive Category at the 2015 Sheffield Doc/Fest Awards.

In 2020, Within was named one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies.

Within thus goes to show the power of technology over storytelling. With the backing of the right technology, getting the right nuances, senses, and settings besides enhancing images is a complete possibility. It helps bring an overall reality to the feature while also adding to the essential “fillers” to make things look plausible, real, and imaginable. In its other genres too, its more than liberal use of AR and VR goes on to show that with the right technology, the possibility of impossibility reduces so much!

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Top 10 Companies Leading the AR/VR Revolutions, 2020

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Top 10 Companies Leading the AR/VR Revolutions 2020

East City Films

Immersing Audiences in Important Stories ast City Films, the leaders in the production of purpose-driven, social-impact storytelling was founded by CEO, Ashley Cowan and CCO Darren Emerson. East City films is the foremost VR documentary producer in Europe, and is also one of the best known virtual reality and augmented reality production studios in London. In an interview with Insights Success, Ashley has shared key details regarding its services and how it is disrupting the whole industry.

E

Could you throw some light on your mission and vision statement?

It is pretty much tied into the statement above – East City Films produces purpose-drive storytelling in VR, AR & film. We believe that immersive technology particularly is at its most effective when putting a viewer deeper into an important story. This is where we want to be, and we are constantly exploring and pushing the tech to see how it can improve the impact of our storytelling.

Below are the highlights of the interview;

How does your AR/VR services unique from the other companies’ offerings?

I think with us, story always comes first, and if that story is purpose-driven then East City Films is the place for you.

Our background is TV and online content rather than VFX, gaming or panoramic photography, so our point of view tends to start through a moving camera lens. However, with AR becoming a much larger part of what we do that is changing, and we are enjoying thinking about how we can augment people’s lives rather than transport them.

What led to the inception of the company?

The company was originally set up as a video production company. Myself and Darren met at MTV and we decided to create a company of our own to produce music videos, live concert films and branded content. We had great early success while delivering content to MTV, Channel 4, the major record labels (and some smaller ones) and multiple brands and agencies. Then in 2014 I got a call from an old school friend at Pearson Education asking us to produce a VR experience. This opened us up to the land of VR and AR. Describe your company and its cutting-edge AR/VR services which address all the needs of your customers.

We pride ourselves as a company that produces purposedriven storytelling in VR, AR and film. If your content need is in some way helping the world become a better place, then we’re all ears. We also produce a great deal of our own IP – which is perhaps what drove more into the world of social impact content-making – and our work has been recognised with incredible festival selections and global licensing deals. Our VR documentary Common Ground was recognised with the Outstanding VR Narrative accolade at this year’s World Press Photo and our multi-sensory VR documentary Some Inattention On The Left is a finalist in the VR Social Impact category at this year’s VR Awards.

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Give a detailed description of your influence over the company and the industry.

I picked up the phone from Pearson Education in 2014 and from then on East City Films has been building a global reputation as VR and AR producers of note. We’ve worked with ITV as they stepped into 360 video with their coverage of horseracing and boxing; helped develop multi-sensory VR tours of whisky distilleries for Diageo and Beam Suntory; brought the Old Vic theatre to 360 video with PwC, collaborated with British Heart Foundation as they stepped into augmented reality and recently helped lobby parliament with a multi-sensory documentary about the lack of community rehabilitation in the UK. But every step of the way has been a team effort - from the day CCO Darren joined me in seeing its potential and created East City Films’ first VR documentary Witness 360: 7/7 to the present day where we are creating an educational AR app, we have www.insightssuccess.com

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“East City Films are well-known for producing VR documentaries that aspire to drive change. This vein runs through their always brilliant, thought provoking work.” been a complimentary duo. With Darren driving much of East City Films’ original documentary making (Common Ground, Indefinite, Waiting Room VR) and me keeping the servicing side of the business busy and looking for new avenues in AR, we are a formidable and forward-thinking team.

How is AR/VR technology disrupting the entertainment and gaming industry?

VR and AR are entirely new mediums and must never be mistaken for versions of TV or worse still, 3D. The experiences we create are simply not possible in any other medium and that is of crucial importance to us. Our VR documentary Common Ground for example is a combination of room scale, 6 degrees of freedom, interactive, stereoscopic 360 video and spatial sound and has been described as providing a “new dawn in documentary” by Sight & Sound magazine. Some Inattention On The Left is a multi-sensory VR documentary which creates an emotional experience in 6 minutes which we hope will change government mandate on community rehabilitation in the UK. Our VR experience Indefinite put viewers in the shoes of asylum seekers in the UK. For us VR and AR is best when purposedriven, and that is in the reason the medium is being used as well as the subject matter it is shining a light on. At its best, immersive technology can change how you feel and think, create a memory which will never fade and perhaps even inspire action. That is a powerful tool already disrupting an entertainment industry looking for more and more immersive experiences.

What technologies are you leveraging to make your services resourceful?

We have always been technology agnostic - choosing the best camera for a particular shot rather than a particular project, for example. More recently we have been developing photogrammetry and volumetric capture both of which are going to be a big part of what we do in the future, both in VR and AR. But as I said earlier, story comes first, tech second.

What are your company’s future aspirations? What strategies are you undertaking to achieve those goals?

We’re enjoying taking on selected larger projects rather than many small ones and are excited by a couple that are very big indeed. We want to continue producing immersive experiences which are purpose-driven and have social impact at their core.

Is this post COVID-19 world going to be a stimulus for AR & VR? We’re looking forward to finding out. Watch this space!

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T

he world is evolving and embracing new technologies, especially during COVID-19. Technology has become the backbone of every industry out there. Despite this truth, there are many businesses still behind the curve. Because of the pandemic, we're seeing businesses affected and many shuttering.

But some companies are starting up, and many are making it. We're excited to highlight one Georgia based business, steadily humming along.

This article will focus on a technology-oriented, digital marketing company ready to help local businesses grow. My Basic LLC is a marketing communication firm in Smyrna, Georgia, contributing to small businesses for more than a decade. Their growing marketing tools and techniques help clients reach and connect with their audience in unique ways. It doesn't matter if they are at home or on the go.

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My Basic LLC is a minority-owned tech business

with experience in VR, App Development, digital marketing, and web design.

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Steward D. Clinton leads the team at My Basic. With a background in marketing, he enjoys helping businesses develop strategies to sustain and grow their business. Creativity and assisting business growth are two of the many factors that drive My Basic, he states.

The Story behind Basic LLC Steward says My Basic LLC started to help businesses embrace and harness technology. They're problem solvers and aim to empower their clients to macro-manage their business. The company traces its roots to Decatur Georgia, where Steward helped a couple of friends launch their websites online.

There was no blueprint to running a business, but Steward learned quickly to come up with a plan, work the plan, and adjust it to fit.

Years later, he saw an opportunity in virtual reality and took it.

Steward says his team is creative, skilled, and always growing.

They're passionate about virtual reality because they see it's potential. They can create fluid VR spaces that cater to education, the medical field, and business. They say VR allows users to learn, train, work, and do business. Virtual reality will enable people to communicate as if they're in the same physical location. "There is nothing new under the sun, but we have a unique perspective to add to VR/AR," says Steward.

The company's mission is to be good stewards of the services they provide. They strive to help their clients help local communities and be profitable. The team at My Basic LLC understands that each client has unique needs, and is managed as such. The company finds its strength in being a resource to people who need its expertise and creative ability. VR can help businesses achieve their learning, business, and training goals in VR/AR. My Basic LLC says it understands that its clients can benefit from a platform that allows them to work and communicate effectively.

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My

Basic LLC Minority-Owned Business Strives to Help Businesses Grow With VR and Digital Marketing

Steward D. Clinton

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Top 10 Companies Leading the ARVR Revolutions, 2020

Steward says his team is creative, versatile, and unique. He says that the company is not the most expensive nor the cheapest but gives a solid return on a client's investment.

They are always thinking about the infused relationship between VR/AR, marketing, and user experience. It is independent; it has a David complexion. This means the company has its own ideas, beliefs, and ways to solve a problem. Because it is a minority-owned business, there is always room to improve its digital technology footprint.

About Steward "When VR came out, Steward invested in the tech to experience firsthand what VR could do. Once he saw the potential for VR in business, education, and healthcare, he desired to venture into the space and find opportunities to grow. Steward aspires to influence the industry with the launch of a new VR headset."

A Glimpse into the Future/Embracing Technology "VR/AR is empowering people to view entertainment in ways our predecessors could only dream about. Experiences are becoming more memorable/ interactive, and this is where the power of VR/AR is. Stories can now be shared in ways never before experienced," says Steward. "One of the technologies that are allowing us to be more resourceful in hardware development is 3d printing.”

He emphasizes that the company wants to create its own VR headset independent of a desktop and laptop. He believes that once the team finishes its prototype, it will greatly benefit its customers. Their goal is to make a quality and affordable headset that helps clients connect online.

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The New Reality

How Snap Inc. is

CARVING

N

ew York Times in 2017 said that Snapchat with a total of 1,900 employees, had “already changed the face of Venice.” And that they did with just the snap of fingers!

Great products, a great name (plus a name change), and acquisitions later, Snap is what it is today, one of the greatest and most prolific of AR/ VR product makers - be it to chat, click images, form videos and communicate in the best way!

It started off as Snapchat which, as is obvious from the name, was a social media platform with one central defining feature: picture messages available to its recipients only for a short time before they became inaccessible. The app which originally focussed only on person-toperson photo sharing, today has its users’ stories in a 24-hour chronological content plus a “Discover,” feature where brands can position advertisements in a short-form content. In addition, the app also allows users to store photos in “eyes only” password-protected formats.

All these, aided by VR and AR, came about due to both inorganic and organic

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G XR SPACE its Name in the

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growth which included lapping up companies like Addlive in May 2014, Vergence Labs (developers of Epiphany Eyewear) and its mobile app called Scan in December 2014, Looksery for the latter’s lenses based on facial-recognition AI-based software for its mobile app, Vurb an eponymous mobile search engine in August 2016, Israel-based AR startup Cimagine Media in December 2016, location sharing app Zenly in May 2017.

Numerous offers for a buyout by everyone from Facebook to Google and everyone in between followed right from their inception to as late as 2016. Today Snap has three products: Snapchat, Spectacles, and Bitmoji.

Originally called Snapchat Inc., it was rebranded as Snap Inc in September 2016 to include the Spectacles product under a single company.

Where Snap differs significantly from the others is in its being a mobile app for social media that places significant emphasis on users interacting with virtual stickers and augmented reality objects. As of March 2020, its subscriber base was close to 230 million active users daily with more than four billion Snaps being sent each day. Given its USPs, Snapchat is known for its popularity among the younger generation, particularly those below 16 with an inadvertent concern being that of privacy.

Increasingly, Snap is turning into an AR company. This can be seen by the kind of additions that we see in its product portfolio. As late as 2019, it added AI in a big way by bringing in a new feature that was called Scan.

The latter uses the AI to record,

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observe and analyse whatever the camera views. Next, it uses its inbuilt AR capabilities to overlay objects and situations that go with what the camera views.

If for instance, you intend to snap images of a mountainous scene or any place with wide open spaces and then big objects at a distance, the built-in features of Scan shall suggest the right lenses to complement the final output. What the user then needs to do is select the option of the lenses that Snap suggest and scan the scene in front to get the perfect image with all the features that they intend. This feature of Snap is in fact in use by 70% of its active users on a day-to-day basis.

Snap’s other feature Spectacles which came to it with its acquisition of Vergence Labs (developers of Epiphany Eyewear) too is unique and shall see extensive use of AR and VR in times to come. These feature spectacles with built-in cameras on the frame which records videos as an addition to Snapchat’s existing platform. Its uniqueness is in the fact that the cameras can record short videos and while syncing the same with the smartphone camera, upload it to one’s online Snapchat account.

The smart lenses were initially handed out through Snap’s own Snapbot, a proprietary vending popup machine.

released in April 2018. More changes were in the offing and in September 2018, two new versions closely resembling typical sunglasses called Nico and Veronica were released.

More was in store. August 2019 saw Spec 3 being released with minimalist frames and two cameras that give stereoscopic vision. It is only a question of time before AR & VR invade this space and Snap slips them into creating entire scenarios using its camera and its resultant digital videos.

Snap has another feature from its 2016 acquisition of Bitstrips, makers of Bitmoji that is visible everywhere these days. That, and World Lenses, a feature that uses AR to apply emojis to every situation around us, sees the extensive use of 3D Bitmoji with the simplest means of tapping the rearfacing camera when in use. These animations can be directed by simply moving around with the phone!

With its sustained integration and development of filters and lenses, these features including the Bitmojis that extensively use AR and VR, stand to become the most effective and efficient way to communicate as also enhance its value while keeping the whole atmosphere light, fun though quite objective.

With rising demand, these went for online distribution in February 2017.

In time these were upgraded with increased storage space for videos and even limited resistance to water where the user wore the same while swimming or recording in the presence of water. The 2nd generation saw response in 17 countries when

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Top 10 Companies Leading the AR/VR Revolutions, 2020

Kagiso Priven CEO Kagiso Interactive RSA

Interactive RSA Improving Business Practices by Using AR/VR

T

he VR engages all five senses like taste, smell, sight, hearing, and touch. Gaming industry is the most popular user of VR. By the immersive reality experience, the gamer can feel the realistic practical experience of gaming, enabled by specific headsets. This approach provides humans with an opportunity to gain new experiences at a specific moment of time.

Guaranteeing the highest level of involvement and immersion, Kagiso Interactive RSA creates exceptional VR solutions that help engage and interact with any audience. Starting from ideation and consulting to design, operation, delivery, and management of XR solutions for customers or enterprises, Kagiso Interactive RSA helps in the areas of sales, marketing, products, services, information visualization and virtual conferencing.

A Story of Hard work and Success In 2006, Privenesh Christie Reddy, CEO of Kagiso, launched Kagiso Interactive. Led by an executive team that has combined technology experience of more than 12 years, Kagiso has maintained an excellent Customer Experience for last 10 years. With 400+ high-quality solutions in mobile and web platforms, the company is also into IoT, AR/VR, Blockchain, and Chatbot development. It bagged more than 300+ happy clients that include multiple Fortune 500, Billion dollar companies. It has enormous experience in six popular industries like transport, education, health care, IOT and wearable, and e-commerce and finance.

Today, Kagiso is an award-winning technology company with

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350+ full-time team members. It is helping Fortune 500 companies, Start-ups and first-time founders to attain their business goals by: Creating their technology product roadmap Improving product experience by delivering outstanding customer experience Ÿ Building strategy to raise capital, launch product, and acquire users Ÿ Ÿ

A Resilient Leader Priven drives strategy and execution for Kagiso and its clients.

He sees every client project as an opportunity not just to deliver a great app but also to help clients implement gamechanging mobile strategies. Internally, he works on nurturing the high-energy and collaborative work culture that Kagiso is known for.

Privens’ approach to end-to-end mobile excellence has positioned his teams to receive many industry accolades, including Best Web Design Agency 2015, Best Mobile App Agencies 2016, and MTN Mobile App of the Year. He strongly believes that attention to detail makes a world of difference and that it can turn something that is just good into something truly amazing.

Get Better Get Ahead Team Kagiso quotes “Always improving and pushing forward”. As the software industry keeps reaching new heights, it is important for the company to keep updated with emerging technologies in order to deliver fresh results to its www.insightssuccess.com

clients. This means being capable of adapting to things that are about to come, keeping in mind that what seems modern right now can be outdated with passing years, especially in this techfuelled world.

Revolutionizing Healthcare Industry Healthcare is also an industry that faces constant pressure to become more cost and time-efficient and hence is embracing virtual reality to provide cheaper and more time-efficient training for surgeons. Kagiso does provide training to doctors/nurses on how to use VR in COVID-19. Virtual reality is a more effective way of teaching students to perform surgeries as it eliminated the bottleneck of having to view procedures performed on live patients. The advanced software being used can also provide individualized feedback and a student’s performance can be recorded and repeated easily.

We empower our clients with technology: Insight, tips, and advice from industry experts

With the help VR, doctors can record video and audio while examining a patient. It also enables surgeons to get interactive augmented reality assistance during surgery, assists in vein visualization and streams ultrasound and allows for interactive printing and demos of how various drugs and devices affect the human body Virtual reality adds value to enhance doctors’ performance, whereas augmented reality’s potential offers vast opportunities for doctors to be able to work more efficiently. Its applications range from increasing surgery success rates to simplifying complex surgical operations, help patients recover, and much more.

Kagiso is developing an AR-powered video support platform that allows for a more detailed interaction between two specialists. This solution is used during medical procedures as well as to train new staff. It is working to develop a device that allows to quickly find veins on a patient’s body, easing the injection process.

The team at Kagiso is developing a solution that allows doctors to spend less time on clerical work through outsourcing it to a transcriber by recording patient examinations with an AR headset.

Getting Advanced with High Tech Kagiso is firmly planted at the intersection of user-focused design, mobile app development, digital strategy, and emerging technologies. It is passionate about leveraging mobile technology including iOS, Android, augmented/virtual reality, artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the Internet of Things (IoT) to help businesses disrupt entire industries and reach their loftiest goals.

Visioning to Become the Leading One Kagiso’s goal is to become one of the world’s leading companies by improving how organizations work and interact with consumers through technology innovations. “To solve www.insightssuccess.com

real-life challenges, we harness our passion for technology and work closely with our clients and partners delivering global products and service,” says the company.

Kagiso’s strategy is to: Ÿ Understand Clients' Needs Kagiso carefully studies each customer case to understand the client’s needs and objectives and delivers a reliable and efficient solution. It analyses all available options and provides competent advice to guide clients to informed business decisions. Ÿ Deliver Maximum Value At Kagiso, the team is committed to delivering maximum value to the clients to help them succeed in a constantly changing and challenging business world. The company’s fundamental corporate values stem from understanding that its success is tied to the success of its clients.

Partner with Clients The company goes an extra mile to become its clients' longterm, trusted partner. It believes that the priority is not only providing professional services and solutions, but also becoming a true technology partner, dedicated to meeting client needs today and supporting clients' growing business needs tomorrow. Ÿ

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