Holoride is a new company belonging to Audi and it aims to bring VR to the back seat of every car. The announcement was made at CES 2019 in Las Vegas, and the system was already tested by some persons.
The company was founded by Daniel Profendiner, software engineer, Marcus Kühne, project lead of Audi’s VR experience, and Nils Wollny, head of digital business at Audi. It appears that all started because Profendiner and Kühne had the same patent in mind.
“We came to the same idea because we wrote the same patent,” said Profendiner
Wollny was the one who decided to take this one step further.
“I’d call it a new media type that isn’t existing yet that takes full advantage of being in a vehicle,” Nils Wollny, Audi’s head of digital business strategy explained.
How does it work?
The best part about this VR feature is that you won’t get nauseous while you use it. In fact, the VR headsets make sure that the things you view match the movement of the vehicle.
“Car entertainment today is limited, you have small screens, people get sick. Here we’re expanding this potential,” Profendiner said. “We wanted to create something that benefitted from moving.”
In fact it is difficult to realise how fast the car is going if you are using your VR headsets. This could even help people who get car sick. According to Holoride, the software development kit should be out by the end of the year. This way, game and content developers can try it out.
If this technology becomes more popular, users will also receive content designed for car rides. Movies and games could be created in order to match the movements of the user. Motion sickness will be greatly reduced, and passengers will find car rides more enjoyable.
Nora Reynolds is a major in biology and a minor in Biological Basis of Behavior, writing about science in general. She also likes to try new gadgets and sports about the AI new era.
