The AR Cloud is Making it Rain!
It’s not as big as dancing hotdogs, but the AR industry is obsessed with it — and it’s raining green.
Just 7 quick months passed since I coined the term, and I am ecstatic to report: the AR Cloud is fully born.
For those who missed my partner’s and my previous posts — no, it doesn’t stand for “Account Receivable in the Cloud”. Nor does it relate to Arkansa’s weather.
The concept dubbed “Augmented Reality Cloud” — provides something sorely missing with current AR Apps: a persistent 3D digital copy of the real world to enable sharing of AR experiences across multiple users and devices.
Just a few months ago it sounded far fetched; it’s incredible to see how much this concept has already bloomed. This post is a progress report for everything happening in the AR Cloud.
Out of Stealth with Cash to Grow
Just in the past month, 3 new investment rounds led by top tier VCs were announced by fantastic AR Cloud companies that emerged from stealth.
Vision: “Blue Vision — build the future of AR”
Money: $14.5M lead by Google ventures
Best for: city scale augmented reality experiences from millions of pictures
Vision: Edit Reality Together
Best for: shared experiences in a confined area
6d.ai — Introduction and Master Plan
Money: an undisclosed amount led by General Catalyst, Super Ventures among others. Conceived while at Super Ventures and led by my partner - the brilliant Matt Miesnieks.
Best for: creating an infinitely large scale mesh from a handheld smartphone with RGB camera, with a goal to support crowd-sourced AR Cloud creation.
These 3 companies join over a dozen companies that already came out as AR Cloud companies — see at the bottom.
Investors are Hooked
With a strong show of confidence, a handful of investors announced a (re)focus on investing in the AR Cloud:
General Catalyst — “to build the AR Cloud”
Shasta Camera fund — “drive the entire AR world forward.”
GFR — “particular focus on mobile AR platforms, AR Cloud”
Presence Capital —” interested in companies that are building AR infrastructure (such as the AR cloud)”
…and of course, yours truly Super Ventures is the fuel behind the AR Cloud.
Forbes is on AR Cloud Nine
Forbes article series helped spread the word with a series of articles lead by Charlie Fink:
The AR Cloud will be bigger than search
Charlie Fink’s Metaverse book made it official — the AR Cloud is now in print. Actually according to Amazon — it’s already out of print!
The Explainers Get It
A series of great explainer articles followed and helped popularized the concept:
Building the AR Cloud by Scape
Why GPS won’t be enough for the AR era by Sturfee
The AR Cloud Explained by Artillry
How We Get to AR Future by Wareable
What’s the point of Augmented Reality by exaquark
AR Cloud is Augmented Reality’s Next Big Evolution by ARCritic
and from GDC… The AR Cloud: Why the future of MR is not a device, it’s all of them
These articles have been translated into many languages such as French (Tout savoir sur l’AR Cloud), German (AR-Cloud für Augmented Reality?, and Augmented Reality ohne AR Cloud ist “nutzlos”), Chinese, and many others.
Open Foundations Are Emerging
Since the beginning of 2018, 2 foundations dedicated to building a decentralized open source-style AR Cloud were announced (more to come soon):
- Norkart’s appeal for an open AR-Cloud community
On Github: https://github.com/OpenArCloud
2. YouAR announced a call for a decentralized, open AR Cloud foundation
Saving Marriages
This is a true testimonial:
“finally my wife understands what I have been doing for so many years and why it’s so damn important!”
— CEO of an AR Cloud company
You are welcome.
Big Players Next Move
— CEO Niantic Labs, John Hanke
During these past few months, we have have seen the big players such as Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Snap, Niantic Labs, Amazon,… paying close attention to the AR Cloud concept and engaging on multiple levels. It resonated with their vision (and perhaps their FOMO) and might have something to do with accelerating their planning. Two key aspects of the AR Cloud: Persistence & Sharing — may soon be provided by Google and Apple and announced at I/O and WWDC respectively, according to sources familiar with the matter.
These new capabilities will be a significant boost to the global AR Cloud and may make some startups obsolete, but they won’t quite fulfill the complete vision of the AR Cloud and that leaves plenty of room for startups to spearhead the concept and take leadership positions.
Events
AR Cloud is becoming a topic at meetups and events around the globe and will naturally be a big draw at the industry’s largest gathering at AWE USA on May 30-June 1, 2018 in Santa Clara California — don’t miss: Building the AR Cloud panel, and the Open AR Cloud Roundtable.
AR Cloud Startups
Blue vision (London) — Bringing new digital experiences to the real world
Ubiquity6 (San Francisco) — Edit Reality Together
6d.ai (San Francisco)- Occlusion, Persistence, Multi-Player, Cross-platform, At Outdoor Scale
YOUar (Portland) —Delivering a World of Shared Augmented Reality
Scape (London) — A digital framework for the physical world
Escher Reality (Boston) [acquired by Niantic Labs]
Escher Reality marks the first AR Cloud company to be acquired this year . I predict it’ll be one of many in 2018.
Sturfee (Santa Clara) — Using satellite imagery to create 3D point cloud
Fantasmo (Los Angeles) — Point clouds for retail and more
Insider Navigation (Vienna, Austria) — Navigation for industrial spaces
Postar.io (San Francisco) — Pin secret digital notes in the real world for your friends to find later
www.arcona.io (Saint Petersburg) — buy virtual land on the blockchain
Vertical (San Francisco)— try their app Placenote!
Recently joined the list, some with flashy press releases:
Immersal — “A new challenger emerges and reaches for the sky and the AR Cloud!”
Miralupa — announcing blockchain-based AR Cloud
Jido Maps — Y combinator recent graduate
0terra — AR Network for multiple users to collaborate
Bubbled — Decentralised virtual spaces and governance for AR content
Mixed Place — the greatest digital revolution in human history
Aromni — The AR Platform of the future
Dent — Retail Reimagined
Xperiel — creating the Real World Web
Is your company missing?
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If you are a startup, investor or corporation interested in the AR Cloud- talk to us.
Let’s partner in building the AR Cloud !
To wrap it up on a sweet note: a 3D cake with AR Cloud on top! (sketchfab)
