Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

Early this morning, the new VR of Meta, the leader of the global metamosmos, revealed that Quest Pro leaked information, and a number of developers have been the first to get this blockbuster product. With the previous Skyworth VR, play out Dream and other companies launched the lightweight VR head show new products, VR head show new products have entered a concentrated outbreak stage.

In the recent bustling VR circle, the influx of new players makes people feel the vitality of the industry, but at the same time, we also find that some important players are gradually disappearing, such as Xiaomi, once known as "domestic VR hope".

Not long ago, PICO recruited two key leaders who had been involved in Xiaomi's VR project team: Nandier, Xiaomi's former design director, and Ma Jess, Xiaomi's main project manager, further increasing his team strength in the VR field.

This also makes people pay attention to the fact that Xiaomi VR, which was once in the limelight in the domestic VR circle, has not appeared in front of the public for a long time. Even the recent hot topic "meta-universe", Xiaomi rarely come out to talk about their layout in the field of meta-universe, Xiaomi VR seems to have "disappeared" in the industry.

This makes people wonder what happened to Xiaomi's VR team, one of the earliest technology giants in the field of layout VR. Why are domestic mobile phone manufacturers silent in the hustle and bustle of "meta-universe"? Where are they quietly working on the layout? With these questions, we try to find out the current situation of Xiaomi VR team.

01. Xiaomi VR, has it broken up? The former members of Xiaomi's VR team are now heavily recruited by major VR companies. Even PICO, the leading domestic VR company, is absorbing members of Xiaomi VR team by acquiring companies and digging corners.

Nadir, the former design director of Xiaomi, joined the byte jump on July 22, after leading the design of tens of millions of products in artificial intelligence, intelligent hardware and virtual reality interactive experience.

The previous month, byte beat also acquired Beijing Bo Particle Technology Co., Ltd., recruiting Ma Jess, once the head of Xiaomi's VR project, and its 50 employees, adding another general to the PICO VR social team.

According to the data, Majesi has worked in companies such as Gering Deep pupil and HTC, and he has joined the VIVE team of HTC, holding the position that VR should be "responsible."

Those who have followed Xiaomi's VR should have the impression that Xiaomi has attracted more attention in the domestic VR industry by virtue of an all-in-one Oculus Go VR in 2018. At that time, one of the main project leaders of this product was Majess.

Majess, one of the core members of ▲ 's former Xiaomi VR team.

In 2019, when asked by the media, "everyone has great expectations for Xiaomi's VR all-in-one machine. They hope that through Xiaomi's strong channel ability, we can really bring this product to C side and bring the whole market up. What will Xiaomi's internal expectations for the outside world think?"

Majess replied, "do it with your life."

When he was devoting himself to the VR industry with an all-out attitude, just when everyone thought that Xiaomi was about to drive the domestic VR industry forward, the Xiaomi VR team suddenly came out with rumors of disbanding.

According to foreign media The Ghost Howls at the time, Xiaomi fired the entire Mi VR / Oculus Go development team, including 12 people who were originally responsible for maintaining and developing the platform. Shortly afterwards, Majesi also left Xiaomi's VR team to set up Beijing Wave Particle Technology Co., Ltd.

At that time, there were many analyses in the industry about the dissolution of Xiaomi's VR team, among which some people in the industry told Zhidong that the sales of Xiaomi VR all-in-one was one of the important factors. It is reported that the total shipment of Xiaomi VR all-in-one is about 250000 units, which is much lower than Xiaomi's "millions" expected at that time.

Although Xiaomi once told the media that Xiaomi's VR team was disbanded as false news, in the following three years or so, Xiaomi VR team did not launch any new products, Oculus Go also removed Xiaomi Mall, and there was no movement about Xiaomi VR's new products in the past two years. In the recent hustle and bustle of "meta-universe" and "next-generation Internet", Xiaomi has rarely spoken on this, and Xiaomi VR is silent.

02. Do you devote yourself to research and development or die midway? what happened to Mi VR? In 2015, pictures of Lei Jun with a black-and-white VR head circulated in the industry. He has expressed optimism about the VR head display industry on many occasions, such as the World Internet Congress.

▲ Lei Jun is asking for information about VR head display equipment.

"in some geek groups and vertical applications, VR technology is already in the ascendant and is expected to see explosive growth in the next 2-3 years," Lei Jun said in an interview with Xinhuanet in 2016. But the widespread use of VR technology will take 5-10 years. "

Subsequently, the first official version of Xiaomi VR glasses was released in Beijing Qiu Deba Gymnasium, causing a sensation.

▲ Xiaomi VR glasses release site

In the following years, Xiaomi successively launched hardware such as Xiaomi VR glasses Play2, Oculus Go Xiaomi VR and so on. For the Oculus Go Xiaomi VR all-in-one, Lei Jun rated the product as "very high-end" and "cool to wear".

At the end of 2018, Xiaomi published an article entitled "Why do We do VR" on its official account, which mentioned that when Lei Jun knew that Xiaomi Exploration Lab was going to develop VR equipment, he mentioned that "you should be prepared for at least five years." And Xiaomi believes that at the hardware level, VR will undergo at least two smartphone-level redefinitions.

▲ Xiaomi "Why do We do VR" (excerpt)

The Xiaomi VR team also discussed issues to be solved in content, payment, social networking and other areas, and tried to overcome them one by one. From this point of view, Xiaomi VR team is really interested in making a career in the VR track.

But the changes in the industry are always unpredictable. What is in front of people is the rumor that Xiaomi VR has not launched a new product since Oculus Go, and Xiaomi VR team is suspected to be disbanded. Is Xiaomi VR aborted without reaching the outbreak of the industry, or is it brewing big moves in the five-year plan? We don't know yet.

Why did Xiaomi suddenly take off its VR all-in-one on July 3, 2020? This may be related to the market environment at that time.

After the VR craze, many hardware products have no suitable scenarios to apply. Therefore, the development space of VR head at that time was very limited, which limited the shipment volume of the whole market.

In addition, at that time, the binocular resolution of Oculus Go was only 2560 × 1440, which was slightly worse than the current Oculus Quest 2 resolution of 3664mm 1920, affecting the user's experience. And, for some users who wear glasses, it is difficult to use them normally.

▲ Oculus Go VR header display

At the same time, at that time, the VR device in the content of the game is relatively simple, it is difficult to have large-scale scene applications, but also difficult to meet the needs of users.

On the contrary, when Xiaomi chose to cut into the smartwatch and the smart speaker track, Xiaomi was more able to play a product advantage when the supply chain was more mature. Therefore, when the market is small and the product form is not yet mature, it is also the practice of most mobile phone manufacturers to choose to withdraw from the track temporarily.

If you observe carefully, you will find that in the four leading "Huami OV" of domestic mobile phones, apart from Xiaomi, Huawei, OPPO and vivo have not launched a new generation of VR in the past three years. At the beginning, mobile phone manufacturers shouted about future-oriented devices, which has become a silent topic for them.

Interestingly, only Huawei chose to upgrade its 3DOF VR glasses to the 6DOF version, while OPPO and Xiaomi have vigorously promoted their layout on the AR track. OPPO has launched a new generation of AR glasses at its future science and technology conference for three consecutive years since 2019. Xiaomi also released its exploratory version of its smart glasses based on optical waveguide technology at the end of last year, announcing that it would build a next-generation computing platform.

Between VR and AR, it seems that more and more mobile phone manufacturers have a deeper layout and greater investment in the field of AR.

03. How long will it take for the next millet VR to appear? On August 2, Mijia glasses camera was officially released, and more than 10 million yuan of public fundraising was completed in half a month. This product ranks first among the fundraisers of millet ecological chain products in 2022.

Although Xiaomi has not launched any new devices in the VR / AR field, judging from the recent news, Xiaomi is keeping a close eye on the VR / AR field.

In November 2021, the relevant person in charge of Xiaomi said in response to the company's layout of meta-universe that Xiaomi was concerned about the opportunities around meta-universe, had made a lot of related technology reserves, and had made relevant investment in mobile phones, video, display and other aspects. Relevant preparations have been made.

From the perspective of investment field, Xiaomi has a continuous investment layout in the field of VR content and supply chain. In October 2021, Danghong Qitian Group announced the completion of hundreds of millions of round B financing, led by Xiaomi War Investment, Jianyin International, Wild Grass Venture Capital, and old shareholder Lenovo Venture Capital.

▲ 's popular VR brand So Real

Subsequently, Xiaomi also invested in Zhige Technology, a manufacturer of optical hardware, whose main business is the research, development, production and sales of optical display modules and diffraction gratings.

▲ to lattice technology AR diffracted optical waveguide TDDW40Plus

Previously, Xiaomi had indirectly participated in the investment of Big friend VR. In 2015, Big friend VR announced that it had received 180 million yuan in financing. At that time, Xunlei became the largest institutional investment shareholder of Big friend VR after this investment, while Xiaomi was the major shareholder of Xunlei.

But will Xiaomi VR return soon? Not exactly.

According to SkyEye data, Xiaomi Technology Co., Ltd. has not applied for any patents in the VR field since 2015.

And, from the recent movements of Xiaomi, Xiaomi is more optimistic about the development of AR glasses, and explore in this direction in advance, Xiaomi intelligent glasses exploration version is also under development. Therefore, before the product form of VR equipment is stable, Xiaomi may tilt its resources to the AR field.

Now, is Xiaomi VR, which has disappeared for nearly three years, temporarily withdrawing from the VR market, tilting R & D resources towards the field of automobiles and humanoid robots, or is it strategically choosing to abandon the VR market and devote itself to the AR track after multiple analysis of the market and cost, or is it trying to overwhelm the whole audience when it tries to complete the "five-year Plan"? We expect Xiaomi to give its own answer.

04. Conclusion: is Xiaomi VR waiting for a good opportunity? Between 2016 and 2017, Xiaomi VR led many people to feel the wonders of the virtual world. Many VR enthusiasts first came into contact with VR when Oculus Go Xiaomi VR all started. From time to time, you may still see regular users of Xiaomi VR on the Internet discussing, "how many years can my Xiaomi VR head show last?" and "can Xiaomi VR head show play Steam games?" That kind of discussion.

But Xiaomi's choice to withdraw from the VR track is also to be expected. When the market and supply chain are not yet mature, hardware manufacturers can only wait slowly. This is the case with Xiaomi, and so are other domestic mobile phone manufacturers, waiting for all kinds of technological bottlenecks to break through.

Today, the domestic VR industry is in a small and most exciting part of the stage, the sales of VR equipment is also gradually increasing. Will Xiaomi think now is a good time to return to the VR track? Or will you continue to wait for the arrival of the eve of the VR product explosion? We wait and see what happens.

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