It’s not all about Silicon Valley; the UK has become a hotbed for VR and AR development over the past few years, with some of the industry’s biggest and best-known teams surfacing in the country. Digital innovation company Digital Catapult wants to keep that momentum going, and this month inducted 10 VR and AR companies into its Augmentor accelerator programme.
Augmentor is a 10-week programme similar to other VR accelerator schemes like HTC’s Vive X. It provides members with access to mentorship from both a business and technical perspective as well as access to resources and support. Digital Catapult has Immersive Labs spaces spread out across the country, including London, Brighton, North Easy Tees Valley and Belfast, as well as the Dimension volumetric capture studio that we’ve visited before in South London.
Perhaps most importantly, though, the scheme will put these 10 companies in front of investors for a showcase in September 2018. Past participants in the programme include the makers of VR creation app, Gravity Sketch, who come onboard as mentors in this round.
The list of companies included is diverse. Swim AR, for example, makes a pair of swimming goggles that will provide you with an AR overlay about your performance when you’re in the water. Valkyrie Industries, meanwhile, is working on a haptic feedback device that will bring a sense of touch into VR experiences.
Elsewhere, Motion Pixel makes a 360 degree video solution with a patented VR stabilization technology, while HoloMe wants to project recordings of humans into the real world using phone AR. The full list of participating companies, taken from a press release, is below.
- HoloMe, London UK: An immersive experience that allows you to interact with famous personalities or event family members as a hologram in your current environment.
- KageNova, Guildford UK: Developing a technology that aims to solve critical outstanding technological problems in VR/ MR systems that are currently stifling user update.
- Lume VR, London UK: A VR platform where scientists and research can explore, manipulate and present their 3D point cloud data and, for the public, a platform to understand important scientific information.
- Valkyrie Industries, London UK: An AI Haptic Interface providing a realistic perception of touch for virtual simulations.
- Swim AR, London UK: An AR heads-up display for swimmers.
- Subconscious VR, Leicester UK: A product that allows tech-aware clients in the healthcare and training sectors to easily deliver group 360 VR.
- Kodama Ltd, London UK: Kodama is the home gaming platform for VR and AR.
- Somewhere Else Solutions, London UK: A multi-user VR solution to power enterprise transformation for global businesses.
- Arcade, London UK: An augmented reality venture design studio.
- Motion Pixel, Tamworth UK: VR and 360 capture specialists holding the patent for a new VR stabilisation technology, reducing motion sickness, post-production load and allowing live, movable 360 broadcast.
