 Thanks for coming out. We're going to do demos after the panel session. So my name is Don Anderson. I'm one of the co-founders of the Asian VR Association. There's two of us who are co-founders and three of us who are actually on the board. We're always looking for more people to help out to organize these types of events. You've probably heard the ute in there. Yes, I'm Canadian. So tonight's session, we're really just going to talk about VR AR, sort of kind of a more of a debate approach. But before we get into it, I just want to thank a few people. The NUS Enterprise team have always helped us out in terms of the location to do this. So we need to give them a bit of a thanks there. We also want to thank obviously our demoing companies. Thank you so much. If you haven't tried out yet, do get out there after the session and try the HCC Vive. We've got some amazing stuff in terms of animation and VR. That's like I think at first. Are you guys like the first doing it? That we know of. That you know of? All right, so if you haven't done that, do that. Try that. So again, what are we? The Asian VR Association is as informal as it is informal as you possibly could be. It's a non-profit association focusing on promoting dialogue, debate, collaboration and investment in this rapidly evolving area of technology innovation. We're really doing this just to help promote the industry. So it's a hack-a-thons every so often every two months. We try to do some form of meetup and gathering like this. And we really like your proactive support. So if you've got ideas, submit them to us, right? We've got a Facebook page, a group that you can submit ideas, join it, find out all the guys on there and the people that are actually in the group are adding all kinds of comments on a regular basis. And sharing information. We're getting a lot of intrigue and interesting comments from around the region too, as well from Australia to China to you name it. So there's obviously a lot of momentum in this space and we'll talk about that in a bit here in a second. And as I said, the format of the evening, we changed things up a bit. Roy suggested we do, you know, go more in terms of demos and focus on a panel session, which we're doing. We'll run this for about 30 to 40 minutes. We'll take your questions. Let's make it interactive. We had a good debate the last time out, so let's make this one just as the same. Demo wing companies, VR collab, Blipper and Warrior 9. Thank you so much guys for taking the effort to... Can we give them a round of applause if it doesn't... Particularly setting up the age to see bye, right? Panel introductions. I'd like to thank Ariel for coming out, founder and MD of Takanto Virtual Reality, Chris Bell, business director for APAC, for Blipper, Max from Creative Director, Eon Reality. And Mithru came in for RGA at the last minute. Thanks so much. And RGA is an agency. So what I'm going to do is each panelist is going to take three to five minutes to talk a little bit about what they do, what the company does, and explain what their interest is in this whole space. So one by one. Take it away, Ariel. Okay. Thanks so well, everyone. My name is Ariel. I'm the founder of Takanto Virtual Reality. Takanto is one of the first VR production companies in Singapore. We've been working over the last two years with leading global brands. We've been working with Flight Center to introduce the first travel industry VR experience in stores in Asia. We're actually having the... We have the Flight Center VR marketing manager over there as well today. So Takanto is basically started as a production company focusing again on creating VR experiences for the travel and tourism industries. We've expanded to some other verticals over the last year. We're going to launch a few projects with leading airlines in a couple of weeks. On top of doing productions, we also offer advanced interactivity layer. So we are able to put a layer of interactivity additional information on videos to allow some of the more educational industry-related kind of applications. Other than that, I think basically that's it. So again, production, interactivity on top of videos, and the sky's the limit. Maybe they are in Europe too. Chris, you want to give her a shot? Yeah, great. So Chris from Blippa. So Blippa is a visual discovery app. Essentially, with our platform app, we allow people to point their phone objects or items or brands and unlock content or augmented reality experiences. So we work with a lot of the biggest brands globally, the likes of P&G, Nestle, Unilever, Pepsi, Coca-Cola. We also work with some of the biggest publishers, so Condé Nast, Time, as well as partnering with some of the biggest celebs, the most famous celebs. So we've done some work with Justin Bieber in one direction. I guess not forgetting as well some of the education work that we do globally as well. So we have 50,000 teachers globally that are using Blippa in the classroom to help enable the learning experience and enhance that use of augmented reality. So in Asia-Pac, we have had an office in Japan and India for two years, and we most recently launched our office in Singapore as the regional hub seven months ago. So we've had a lot of really great traction here and great appetite from the regional global brands that we work with. And I think, specifically in this region, we're seeing a real uptake around the behavior that we're trying to create, which is essentially people pointing their phone at things and blipping things. So blipping is essentially our verb. And we really cut that down to the fact that in Southeast Asia people are very much mobile first and they use their mobile in a very different way than the other parts of the world. And we see that as a big opportunity for ourselves here in this region. So if you haven't seen the demos already, then come over after this. RGA is an advertising agency. The reason I'm here, I'm a software engineer, but the reason I'm here is I'm kind of the understudy for my boss, the tech director, Loran. Loran's unfortunately in Shanghai at the moment, but that doesn't discount the kind of discussions that we have. So for the most part, I joined RGA about three months ago for their prototype studio. The prototype studio just launched in Singapore. We explore different technologies. I'm more of an explorer. Explore different technologies, how exactly we can use them in advertising. So the potential partnerships with people like Blippar, for example, and that's basically my role. Previously, my experience with VR and AR, in a previous agency, we did experiment and we did systems to augment or rather extend the capabilities of existing VR platforms. We built a, this was early last year that we built a panel like a smell. We added scent to VR, where we, so essentially with different scenes, there would be different scents. It was still an advertising agency that I worked at, Max's. And yeah, so that was one. Another one was about having your hands. So basically a view through where you could actually see your hands within virtual reality. We used the leak motion for that. So yeah, I mean, not too bad in terms of experience with VR, I'd say. But yeah, and that's basically it for me. All right. One thing, can everybody hear back there? One thing you need to do is to hold it. The mics aren't that sensitive, unfortunately. So you got to really put it up there. Yeah. It takes back. All right. Okay. I'm Maxim. I work for a company called Yonradity. So Yonradity has been active for actually 17 years. So it's a pretty old VR company. And it started some time ago with, I would say, systems like caves. I don't know if some people are familiar with caves or it should be in many of those. So it's, I speak with my hands. So it's a four walls display. It was four projectors. It's a very heavy footprint. So we've done VR with domes, with caves, with lots of different sort of in-message displays. And I joined this company three years ago. What we do, the type of clients that we have are essentially in education. So we do a lot of vocational training. And I think that's where VR has been very efficient for a long time. Doing simulators to train pilots, for example. Or doing simulators to train other operators or to train people to do aircraft maintenance. So this is really our core knowledge to train people to do those things. Now, right now, our company is moving more towards mobile technologies, of course. And we are developing a mobile application for K-12 called Young Experience AVR. And it's an application that we allow kids to experience 3D content in augmented reality and in virtual reality. And we're betting a lot on the development of technologies like Tongo, for example. And that's it. Thank you. So as I said, let's make this interactive. If you have any questions throughout, just shake your hand up and fire away. So let's talk about augmented reality versus virtual reality. Of yourselves, who is in favor of either or? Do you want to take this area? Would you? Oh, go for it. Oh, no. So for me, for the most part, I think it's... Hello? Yeah. Personally, I mean, I'm more biased towards augmented reality just as a result of it being a lot more, at least in 2016, a lot more functional. Virtual reality is a lot more expressive. I mean, that's the... I studied at LASAL, so that's the artist in me kind of speaking and saying, you know what, no, to hell with functionality, be creative, go all out with virtual reality. But yeah, I mean, like in terms of function, I would still be AR, creativity, VR. Aaron, what do you think of that? We know what you think, Chris. We'll come back. Well, I would say I refuse to answer this question the way it's phrased at the moment, because I think the answer is really different depending on two key parameters. The industry, of course, but I would even say the way you want to use it, because I look at three key pillars, I would say. There is the marketing pillar, there is the business pillar, and there is the entertainment pillar. And then you need to break it down to industries, and I think it's a different answer for each one of those industries or verticals. So even though I'm very biased towards VR production and yet, Takanto, we need to be real here. You know, there are a lot of business uses for AR, definitely. Entertainment-oriented use cases. So I would say, you know, different answers for different industries. Chris, you were going to add to that. Yeah, sure. And obviously I'm going to go in the AR camp, right, being from Blipper. But I think, for me, I think the time for VR will come. It will develop over the next five years, obviously. And I think the way I look at it right now is how many people have virtual reality headsets at home right now. Probably very little, whereas essentially everyone has a smartphone. But I think, you know, some of the things we're looking at at Blipper is essentially investing in what we're calling mixed reality. So essentially, embedding augmented reality tech technologies into headsets and glasses. So actually using that technology in a sort of mixed reality type field. Which I think, to be honest, is probably going to be the next phase before really VR takes off as a mass consumerized product. But I mean, I absolutely agree that there is huge benefit in what VR brings to the table now in specific sectors. Is it powerful right now from a marketing ROI point of view? Then I'm not sure, right? But I think from an entertainment or storytelling or movies kind of space, then I think it's super powerful. I actually agree with that. You kind of raised your eyebrows here for Zagreb. Yeah. Well, actually I tend to disagree. I think there are more people who actually have VR headsets and people who have VR headsets at home. Even though right now you can experience AR with a mobile phone, mobile phones are definitely not the best way to experience AR. I think, at the same time I saw Zagreb and more, I like it a lot. I think the access to data through image, I mean just by spending something, I think this is great. But the overlay of our reality, I think this is very gimmicky. I've always had the right word in English. And I think the reality is already very cluttered and we don't need to add more advertising to it. I think it would be great if we could remove advertising from our reality. So that's my point of view. So what about the substantive, what are the differences for those who really may not be as well acquainted with this space as yourselves? What are the differences between the two? Between. Between VR and AR in terms of experience. Oh, wow, okay. Well, VR, the ultimate goal of VR is to actually hijack all your senses. So right now we are just hijacking the sound and the sight, the view, you know? But in AR, we are just... I mean, AR, I'd rather say mixed reality. We are just hijacking certain senses, or just actually part of your senses. So we can augment your environment by adding some sounds or augment your environment by adding some visuals or maybe some... That's it. Well, Ariel, you mentioned before industries that you feel VR is more relevant than others, than AR perhaps, and vice versa. Yeah. So I do believe that there are certain industries that VR is more relevant than AR. By the way, I also disagree with this. I mean diplomatic, honestly. I think VR is far better now compared to AR, but I do see AR getting momentum in five years. I think if we look at VR and AR, AR has been around for several years already. Now it's running, you know, piggybacking the VR. That's what I feel. But again, five years from now, definitely I think you'll have your room. In terms of verticals, well, as mentioned, I think the travel and tourism industry has really embraced that hospitality as well. You know, the Marriott Hotel brand, Flight Center, Thomas Cook, and other drug travel groups globally, I'm not sure if you're familiar with the names, the Middle East as well, because this justifies being fully immersed in a different environment as opposed to getting a layer of additional info on top of something else. So I would say travel and tourism is definitely more VR oriented. On the other hand, for AR, I might give you the microphone for that, but just my take on AR, additional layer, it's for a day-to-day kind of, from a business perspective, day-to-day kind of jobs of maintenance, for example, pilots, you know, there is a very advanced helmet for pilots where you can actually see info projected in front of you. So it's more practical for those kind of applications, I would say. Do you want to talk to that, Chris? Yeah, I mean, from an AR point of view, so we work at scale with a lot of, you know, consumer goods companies, package goods, F&B companies, and I think, you know, what we talk about a lot is essentially how marketers have forgotten about the power of their product, right? So I guess one of the things to hammer home is the fact that there's more products out there that are sold every day than there are YouTube views, Google searches and also Facebook likes, right? So there's billions and billions of SKUs out there, right? So with AR technology, that can now, each piece of packaging can be a gateway into a content experience, a utility, or even a repurchase decision, right? So that's, for me, where the power of AR is right now, is creating those utilities and digital services on top of brands, versus sending someone through to a website, and also creating an opportunity to cross-sell and resell to a person who's already bought a brand. From your perspective, from an agency perspective, what are you focusing on at RGA? Are you looking at AR, VR independently or together when you're working with brands? I think we're looking at them independently, and that's a personal take, and we're looking at them independently purely because they're different experiences altogether. Just as a result of virtual reality, yes, there are some really amazing campaigns out there, and at the same time, augmented reality as Plippar does, and I think they're two different tracks altogether, and I don't think, at least the agency should look at them in a singular kind of, or put them in the same kind of bucket. I mean, yes, there is, it's not a complete black-and-white kind of scenario. It is, there is a very gray area, but a personal take is that it's, right now, at least for the agency, it's quite distinct, and we should be looking at it relatively distinctly. So what are you favoring, though? Are you pitching one over the other? Right now because, well, the hype is on VR, so it has to be VR, definitely. There's absolutely no way. But again, just before we move on, I have a question for Ariel in that sense. Yes, you did talk about experiences, you did talk about flight simulators, for example, or in-app experiences and whatnot, but what are your thoughts on the fatigue that happens? Like, you know, yes, you try it out, and then would you try it out again? You try it out a couple of times, but beyond that, you would have to create new experiences for sure, right? And content here isn't like a video where videos we're used to, we will watch different types of videos, and it's still going to be there, but these are experiences you're not creating content. So I absolutely agree that this would have been a concern if companies like Samsung and Google and Facebook have embraced that so strongly. But since, you know, now you're going to have consumer-ready 360 cameras, and Facebook is all about 360 pictures, 360 videos, so it's being pushed so aggressively in a way that I believe will ensure, at least for the next several years, that it will get momentum. So content, actually it's a concern for companies like my company in a way, you know, we produce high-end kind of VR experiences, but then what will happen if everyone will be able to capture the same kind of content. So we are not concerned about the lack of content, we're concerned about being able to differentiate to be innovative in terms of an added value on top of the content that there is today. Actually, when you look at this space too as well, in terms of we talked about this yesterday when we caught up at your office, this becoming more ubiquitous and in terms of adoption, we talked about the phase of evolution, where do you think we are right now? Oh, right now, I mean, it's still in the womb, actually. It's the very early beginning, I've seen nothing here. It's going to be, I mean, just don't get me wrong, I really believe in it, actually. I think something will come, but the technology is just not there yet. Five years, probably. Can I ask, how many of you actually have VR headsets at home? Raise your hands. That's quite a few. Not bad, pretty much weighted on this side here. Let's break that down then. Cardboard type sets. I'm not saying that because I work for Google. Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, still niche. And Gear, of course, we got Samsung here. Wow. And there you are. Yeah, and then let's talk about AR. How many of you use AR on a regular basis? Sorry, Chris. I think it's not about putting you on the spot. Be interesting why you think that is at this moment. I mean, it's to be honest, it's very much aligned to the direction that look is moving into now. So, you know, I think the comments around AR has been around for a few years, come and gone, come and gone is fair. And there's a lot of cool, wow experiences that brands have built to take that innovation budget, sorry, to take that innovation box within our particular plan, right? And at Blick, really, we're trying to move away from that now, right? To create utility for those brands, which is really why we've completely flipped our business model now, right? So, right in my introduction at the beginning, I talked about us as a visual discovery app, right? So, we're actually using a mix of artificial intelligence and computer vision technology and augmented reality as a content delivery mechanism to essentially overlay content onto real world objects, right? But there's a difference in the way we're positioning ourselves now. We're an AI engine versus an augmented reality engine, right? So, we believe merging those technologies together will give a real utility to consumers. So, I think, you know, in a year's or opening a year's time, there'll be a lot more hands up in the room because there'll be a daily usage for you to use an app like Lippa. And that's really the journey we're on now is to drive that ubiquitous behaviour of people flipping. Just as people Google things, we want people to use Lippa as a visual search tool, essentially. And then when they see a brand like Coca-Cola, they flip it and they get a really cool AI experience. So, that's where we're going from a business point of view. How does one make money from AR and VR? So, I mean, currently we have done them for the last four years make money through production, right? So, we produce augmented reality experiences using our platform. And in the future, that will change as we move into more of a sort of visual discovery AI space. There'll be sort of media type engines based on top of that. And that will come out in the next six months or so. But yeah, purely production at this stage. Excellent. Well, for us, it's been essentially a niche market, as I said. So, it's by establishing partnership with the educational institution, with the regions. So, we partner with universities and we install some centres there where we train certain workforce. So, that's what I was describing earlier. Civilations. For example, one that we have is in IT, right here in Singapore. And we use it to train ordering workers, ordering operators. And we put them inside a huge white room and then we turn off the light. And then we are transported on our weekends to behave in a crisis scenario. So, and well, that's it. So, we've set just a very expensive solution. This is changing much though. We talked about this yesterday. You're one of the first in. You've been doing this for quite a while. Yeah. So, you have to adjust. Yeah, of course. So, I think for us, the big challenge is to move towards mass market, of course, right now. And so, we're not going to be able to sell the technology anymore. So, what we can do is to create a distribution platform that we're doing and focus on excellent content delivery. And I think the content will be a key issue in the future. I think actually video game companies have a big advantage right now. You know, you want to talk to that as well. In terms of how you work with brands, you've got the Flight Center here. How did that process, where do you start? So, this is a challenge indeed to really put an ROI kind of model against an investment in virtual reality. So, and by the way, I think that developers and startups should always keep that in mind. Sometimes I see startups going for the cool stuff, but they're never really asking themselves what kind of business use would that have. So, the way we work with brands, so we actually did took the approach of trying to see VR as a business tool from the beginning, meaning it's not just about creating some sort of experience customers will come in, put it on, wow, that's cool. Flight Center is all about travel, and then move on and talk to the consultant. So, we actually looked at it as a tool that will be used by consultants to sell destinations. So, it can be destinations that people are aware of, but we will feature some hidden gems or hidden spots within those kind of destinations. We're going to launch a clip on Gold Coast shortly. So, Gold Coast is a destination that many people already know, but we will be featuring some places around Gold Coast which are not that common or commonly known. And also, we look at how can we use VR, so each clip that is being produced is not just about being a sales tool for consultants, it's also about training consultants because you're a better salesperson when you actually know what you're selling. Because today, you can't really send consultants all over the world to see all that. And through a virtual reality experience, they'll better sell people in a way by being able to really talk about what they saw when they're trying to sell. So, there are two different angles for that. Making specifically around the travel and tourism industry. So, how to the travel piece? Do you think that VR could be a substitute experience for that actual hands-on travel experience? Do you think we'll see people just sitting at home and non-traveling in the future? That's a question that I think might... Don't be a little worried about that. So, not at the moment. It's not that good to replace the real life experience. We're still being cautious. We're not documenting places for more than one minute. So, people will still feel as if they need to go there to explore. In the future, maybe... The hardware is changing. We're going to have 4K phones. Maybe. Actually, I think one of the initiatives that they had was to take their VR headsets to an elderly institute to really allow people who can't afford traveling to experience how it feels to be in Tokyo, Vietnam. So, at the end, I do believe that there will be a way to sell holidays in a VR kind of complex. I'd like to hear a software engineer's opinion on this space in terms of what is required. What, in terms of talent, does this space need? I think one thing is... I mean, it's still... Yes, it's been around for the past 40 years, but only now has the hype come about to a degree where everybody is actually caring about it and actually putting proper work by proper work. I mean, I'm not at discount for the past 30 years, but in terms of user experience, in terms of how the user feels, we're really going places, I think. Because two years ago, when I tried the Oculus Rift, I felt like I was in Mario World. No, I mean, literally, because the thing was the resolution wasn't as great as it is today, and in two years, we've come that far. Like, I used to get VR sickness very easily, and I think now, so that's the thing. I think in terms of actually improving the headsets we have improved, and I think in terms of talent, you need to understand what exactly is happening. And in terms of even user experiences, you need to understand how exactly content should be made for example, I think I just speak to a few people a couple of weeks ago, and they were talking in depth about transitions between scenes, and I think it completely blew my mind because it's something so simple, and yet they did it very well in terms of cutting between scenes, and it does kind of distract your user if you don't do it right. So I think things like that, like there are very tiny bits that you really need to focus on, like right from production to, I mean, the programming part anybody can pick up, but in terms of actually user experience, I think more and more focus on that is required and is the case of this. But you're doing outdoor exhibits, exhibitions, events and such too, as well. How do you approach that? Because that's a different type of content experience. So how do you program to that? With VR outdoor? I mean, I'm sorry. It's more like pop-up type of studios and type of things too, as well. But with advertising, that generally is the case. I mean, just as a result of campaigns not having to exist for more than a couple of weeks at most, I think just creating experiences just for that one, which is why the vibe would be really important or really important in that space, I'd say. So from your perspective of what you've seen in terms of experiences that are probably branded, what have you seen that you're most intrigued by or that's really sort of piqued your interest? I... Outside of your own work. In terms of advertising, I haven't been fully impressed by any particular work, but there was this one particular artwork that did intrigue me from a couple of years ago. It was by this Brazilian artist. I forgot his name, but he created this experience where people could exchange bodies for the most part. So essentially both of them would wear a headset. And this was two years ago. And it was a really surreal experience. I actually tried it out and it was really surreal. And sorry, in terms of advertising, there is one that kind of popped up in my head just now. There was this Swedish brand, Telco brand, that was... I think the campaign was about if you can't... I mean, if a lag is unacceptable in real life, a lag should be unacceptable for the internet as well. And they did this VR piece where it was a live feed, but with a lag of three seconds or so. And they got people... It was just a video, but it was really cool. I think it was quite interesting the way they kind of brought it about. And it was very interesting. VR wasn't the story. It was a tool used to tell a story. And I think that's interesting. What do you think? There's a lot of momentum. There's a lot of, obviously, a lot of interest. Do you think a lot of this is real or is it still a lot of tire kicking? My personal belief is that it is hype at the moment because last year, we were talking about internet of things and yes, it will be a big thing in two years, but where is it now, right? It's still going on. Yes, don't get me wrong. It's still going on. But for the hype it was last year, where is it today? It's happening, but... Maxim, you got any opinion on that in terms of where we are? Whether this is all real? I think the thing with VR is that it's already have a market in the gaming industry. So it's really growing very steadily. I don't think we see a... Well, I don't think... I think it's just going to grow steadily. Now, maybe the hype will not be as much in the advertising industry. I think for a while you will pitch VR to your clients and say, OK, VR, we competed a little bit last year and we don't want it anymore. But yeah, I think it's going to grow steadily and it's probably with the form factors that it's going to evolve for the headsets that we're going to see a lot of adoption. I think right now, regarding the resolution, you were talking about the resolution, it's around I think by 2020 that we have a full resolution in port of the human eye. So by then, I think the expenses will be quite containing. So when we talk about VR tourism, yeah, we will be there definitely. Now, yeah, that's it. What's going to sustain this, though? What industries are going to sustain this? Is it consumers? Is it B2B? The gaming industry will sustain that. I believe initially. Looking at VR and AR, I think VR is going to be around thanks to the gaming industry. But this is a very, very... trying to avoid the gimmicky perception of VR is happening now. I think it's something that can be missed easily. So it's a very sensitive kind of area. So I think that companies that work in the VR space around business applications should really be focused on showing the business value of VR to make sure companies will embrace it, not just as a gimmick. Otherwise we'll find it only in cinemas and gamers will use VR. That's also why I do believe that AR in the long run will have a better potential. People will still like to be able to communicate with the environment, I believe. Chris, you've traveled around a lot of SEA and in Asia. What have you seen in terms of other markets uptake? Which markets are really leading this kind of push from your perspective? We've seen a lot of uptakes specifically in the likes of Thailand and Vietnam. Very much around high growing smartphone penetration and connectivity there. And a really young user base there to adopt this new behavior. But I think it's going to take time to really take off as a ubiquitous behavior. That's really the job that we've got over the next 12 months is to make that happen. That's our mission here in the region to make sure that happens through campaigns and also other activities that we're going to be doing further on in the year. But no, I think some of the conversations are really interesting around VR and I think for me the danger that I see is that it falls into the same trap that AR did four years ago or five years ago that it just becomes a gimmick where people try it or the clients have tried it or they come back to it and they don't want to go back and try it again. So I think it's your point of AR industry. Just maybe one more aspect other than gaming industry and the business usage is the social VR. Not sure if you've got a chance to experience that. I think there is a massive potential in social VR where you can really be in a room with other people virtually and communicate with them. So again, it has a lot of potential to be the key to the mass market, I believe. I'd like to add also that VR has been around for quite a while and it's proved that it was useful. Now it was just very expensive and no one had access to it and now it's becoming accessible and it doesn't have anything to prove. What markets, though, going back to the question how do you think Singapore fits into all of this? We've got a lot of people showing up to these meetings and they continue to grow. A lot of companies coming out, too, as well getting a bit more profile. Where are we in that ecosystem in terms of capabilities, delivery, content, you name it? Who would like to take that first? No one. Anybody out there? How do we rank? We're number two in the region. Australia is number one, I believe, in terms of adopting VR surprisingly, maybe. To some of you, but the amount of VR companies and production companies and innovation that are coming out of Australia is amazing, I think. But Singapore is just catching up with them and we have, again, a Singapore company doing business in Australia, which we're quite proud of, because I do see Australia as... Do you agree? I think what we're seeing is Japan's way ahead of everyone else. So the office in Japan's been around for two years and the thinking from clients and also the experiences from another are really leading the way in this region. I think Singapore is catching up, to be honest, from an AR point of view. I can't speak obviously of VR, but from an AR point of view, I think it's catching up. I'm honestly not too sure about where Singapore ranks in the region, but for advertising, there is a lot of buzz in the region, both in Singapore. China, actually, surprisingly, this is a year ago, at least, or a couple of years ago. China did show a lot of interest in augmented reality. Coke did approach me personally for a separate campaign, but they were... I mean, I don't know where. To be honest, I don't know where Singapore by itself ranks within the region or globally, so I'm not sure if I'm the best person to answer that. I'm a bit like you, I don't really know, but we work a lot with Middle East and we have lots of funky rich friends coming from there. There's always more holograms and new technologies. Recently, there's a movie called Hologram for the King. I think that summarizes pretty well how there is an interest in that region, actually. Our friends from the MDA here, anybody from the EDB? Put them on the spot. Investment, let's talk about that. Where does it need to come from? Is there enough going into the space right now in terms of investment? Behind startups? There's a few startups in the room here. Anyone like to take that? No one has a comment. I think last year, we were, like, as with our older agency, they did put a lot of money into VR, not so much, I mean, but again, I think that's when the hype started going up, right? So advertising has to either make the trend or be the trend. Do you think there's enough money going into the ecosystem at this point, I guess is the question? No. So what's holding it back then? I think risk aversion, complexity, barriers to entry, I think, but I mean, I think, you know, from our experience being here, we're having some very good conversations right now with the different agencies across the government to try and utilize that technology. So yeah, I think we'll watch the space, but I think there needs to be more innovation in this space and more investment from, you know, specifically the Singaporean government and back in their smart cities initiative, right? I mean, it's a perfect group of technologies to bring into that space and prove it's worth within a small city like Singapore, right? So yeah, so hopefully we see more of that grow as the year goes on. Part of this is also going to education as well. So how do you actually build a team of people who can build this type of technology? Well, open enough. You can take it. I have a comment about the investment side of it. I think from AR perspective, people still observe what's happening to see which company will stand out, which technology will stand out. Even between the giants, the HTC Vive and Oculus, it's really interesting to see which one will catch more attention from the markets. There is some delivery issue with Oculus which really helped vibe and now there is an open source kind of headset that is going to come out. So I think people maybe are a bit reluctant to invest before they really know where it's heading and then we'll see the momentum personally. That's why I think. So the question in terms of the capabilities, how you build a team, is there enough resources even in this market to be able to support that? Unfortunately, no. By the way, if you are into production and we are filming, please talk to me afterwards. We have a few interesting projects and we don't have enough videographers. No, so it's not as scary and as hard as people may perceive it. And there are different kind of roles and different kind of skills that are required to do that. I don't think there are clear methodologies yet. It's being developed. So when we actually try to certify someone or really get someone on board with that, it's mostly shadowing on the job kind of training. I guess there will be certifications along the way. Standardization. Maxime, you moved into a nice new office. Yeah. Actually, I completely agree with you. There is no send out in VR. That's what is exciting. Actually, when we recruit people, it's because we can recruit truly creative people who want to set those standards. You know, it's like a really uncharted territory. So I would say when we're looking for technical skills, the game industry provides a huge amount of talents and right now there is a big attraction for VR. So for us, I would say there is not far from here a game design school called DigiPen. So yeah, we recruit a few people from there. They have a good training. Now, apart from that, we're really open to anyone who would want to venture into this field. Do you guys want to comment on that? Yeah, go ahead. No, no, no. I think that's something about this person. Let's turn it to the crowd. Quite a few. No one's mentioned Magic Leap yet. And that seems to be elephant in the ring for me because it's headset. It's something else who knows what it is. Don't work for Google. They invest a lot of money. Big tons of money. Any thoughts? Look, I mean, that's what we can do. I know. I can ask that question recently, my E27 is kind of like, look, there must be something behind it. I mean, I haven't seen it. I don't think anybody really has seen it. So I would assume that we're trusting these guys that have all the, you know, obviously the numbers are doing the numbers behind the scenes. They must be believed in something. I can't really comment from a Google standpoint because again, that's completely the other part of the business. So yeah, what do you guys think? Is there anything to it? I should have said I couldn't comment period without saying it's a different part and then you would have started like this. That's how conspiracy starts. I don't have any for you, sorry. Yeah, okay. I think that's part that goes back to maybe my statement about people still trying to figure out which direction is the right direction because yeah, when Google invests in something you might want to take one step back and really see where it's going before. I mean, for me, I hope it is going in the direction that it looks like it's going. I think it's a huge opportunity for the whole industry, right? Both they are and they are. So yeah, I hope it is going to be what it looks like it's going to be. Yeah, more or less the same. I mean, we don't know, right? We can't comment until we know for the most part. The advertising industry is going to be great. I mean, they're going to jump on it even before it's out. That's the mystery of it, right? Yeah, I don't know much either. I just saw a photo of the CEO with a little lens in his hand. So I hope that's what you put in front of your eye. Then it would be great because this would be a real AR device. But that's not the case. I don't really know what happens. Sorry, I wish I'd seen it. I know. Anyone else for the question? You know, you've seen the demo from HoloLens. You know, this woman put on the HoloLens and they can basically swap between virtual reality and augmented reality. And essentially, a lot of the demos that I've seen from VR, they're basically very contained. You know, in the sense that you need somebody to program the whole video and you're basically limited to that set, right? So there's no possibilities. But what we want to see is limitless possibilities, like what we've seen in the video, in the demos, like, you know, you can choose your path once you're inside that virtual world, right? So what do you think will need to happen and how long do you think it will take for us to get there? Do you think we need huge advances in artificial intelligence as well as chips, the computing power for content to start creating in limitless ways, you know? I don't really understand which kind of content you're talking about, but I've identified, I'd say two types of content. There is one content which is dynamically generated by a real-time 3-engine and this one, you can evolve as much as you want. Of course, there are some constraints that are set by the designer, but you can move around freely. Normally, you can interact with objects in certain modalities that were set by the designer. And now there is also, there's only one I don't really like, but you can see a lot of it. It's 360 videos. And maybe this is what you're referring to. So when you go in those experiences, there's nothing you can do already. You just can't look around, you know? And quite often, those videos are not so interesting because the director cannot focus on a specific point with an interesting story. So I would like to hear more about what you're talking about, actually, what kind of experiences you're creating. So, I mean, is it really possible for a content creator to program all that? I mean, probably a certain set of rules and a certain set of algorithm, but the thing is that unlimited choice, unlimited content creation based on your decision in that virtual world, it's not something that I've seen before. It will happen for a bit. I mean, we give you more and more and more freedom, more and more creative freedom. I mean, as you said, artificial intelligence will grow, computing power will grow, and you will be able to... I mean, the applications themselves will understand what you want, maybe what you think, and they will adapt to you. And this will simplify your interaction with the virtual world tremendously. My name is Wanda. I'm from a local gaming company called Armageddon. We do gaming peripherals. So this is actually targeted at gaming, which I'm not too sure how much exposure I have to it because from what I'm hearing, it seems to be slightly limited, but I'll ask anyway. So for us, what's really important is mainly two things, existence of content, sorry, three things, accessibility and also the practicality of the headset or any VR experience, and that's mostly what I'm looking into at the moment. The only thing that we've really found to be accessible of reasonable democratic design is the typical gear VR, which I find very limited, and in terms of content as well, the games that we have are quite simplistic, like even more so than Candy Crush. So how long do you think it would take for us to move forward? Is there something that I'm not looking at? So in terms of the accessibility, practicality-wise, a lot of the headset are still very heavy. So in terms of gaming usage, anything... you can only use it for about an hour or so, and then it gets tiring or you get motion sickness. So that's the second thing that we are looking at to not say... we ourselves can't exactly overcome it because we're large team manufacturers, we take existing technologies and we produce it mass-marketed. So how long do you think it would take, basically, to get past that big heavy headset and not being able to get a good audio out of it as well? Oh yeah, accessibility. So in terms of it being accessible, I'd like to share that in our region, Southeast Asia, which is actually where we operate, if the headset costs anything more than about $200 USD, it would not, to us, be considered accessible in our region. So do you think there's a chance for us to get there, or is it just simply impossible because VR is just simply expensive? So there's a lot of questions there. I think accessibility-wise, and then experience. I'll try. So I... I tried to do a calculation. I was trying to see when would the screens, the screens that we use in headsets, when they would be equal to the resolution of the human eye, and it turned out to be around 2020. Okay? And after that, you can expect those screens to shrink, shrink, shrink, shrink, and then you will have devices that will be very acceptable. However, I think this might be completely useless as a study because there is so much interest in this technology right now that I'm sure that people will come with solutions that will solve your problem much before. So I think, very strictly, since the next five years, you are going to go, right? I think with the gaming industry, it's not just the headset. In terms of your accessibility question, it's not just the headset, right? You need the controller, you need a whole bunch of other things. And I'm personally not completely sold with the idea. I mean, both of you feel that games are really, really into VR. And I think, yes, in a way, definitely, games in VR, they go hand in hand. But for the most part, I'm not completely sold. I just hope, I mean, I hope that they are. I hope that it is the case, but I just hope it's also not something like the Kinect. The Kinect was really beautiful in 2005 or something that came out, and we don't use it anymore. Like, that's just, maybe gamers are lazy, I don't know. We really need to think this through, I think. I mean, there is a very niche kind of gamers who do still use the Kinect and who will definitely be using VR. And for them, accessibility is not a problem because they are kind of, they want it, so they will take it anywhere, right? So that's, I don't know, in terms of accessibility, if they are your target, you're going to get your target anywhere, I think. I mean, from processing power and then capability of screen quality and such, I think if I were in the gaming industry, I would have looked at the mobile phones and at the PCs as two different kind of platforms for game development. So, I think makes more sense in a way at the moment to look at the Oculus and the Vive and the PC-oriented kind of VR as more suitable for advanced games. In terms of mobile phone, I read yesterday, I think, that the PSA that will be released early next year will have a very, very advanced screen. So, and the processors will get better and better, so at the moment, I would expect PCs and Oculus and HTC Vive to be more supportive when it comes to increasing processing power naturally. I think we got time for one question. And that gentleman actually had his hand up before, so I think he got dibs. Unless you want to share it. Just mainly my number one, and I actually mainly do production, but I'm digressing into a bit of 360 video, so this question is pretty much targeted to Takanto with a lot of new pro-consumer products matching up with mainly 360 GoPro rigs. How do you differentiate yourself from that production because it's a big price difference? That's a very good question. That's a question we really ask ourselves frequently. I would say, you can look at it from a video camera perspective. Everyone can buy a high-end video camera. Can everyone open a production company? I don't think so, maybe, but there is not really a lot of competition even though high-end cameras can be purchased quite cheaply today by everyone. You still have specialized studios around that. However, having said that, I do think production companies will have to think about the added value they bring at the next level. For example, you can look now at the cameras as mostly monoscopic, so maybe the next phase will be stereoscopic. This will be the standard for production companies. Trying to really be ahead of their game in a way. Adding a layer of interactivity. It's not just about capturing a video, it's also about adding some interactive elements on top of it. At the end, I think we'll find ourselves in a situation which is similar to video cameras today and production companies today. We're going to wrap it up there because we're heading close to 8 and there's probably some people in here that are hungry. One last bit, we'll go around the team here and ask your crystal ball sort of projection in the next year where we're going to be one last sort of statement or summary. You want to give her? Let's talk. Thank you. I don't know, but I just hope that we'll see a piece of the note. So do I. I'm still waiting for the magic leap as well. I think VR is still going to have the edge over AR. I still do like AR to be honest over VR, but I think that's basically my type here. Blipping or using augmented reality and artificial intelligence technologies becomes more ubiquitous. And that's what we're driving towards. So that would be my prediction I think in the next 12 months there will be a lot more hands come up when you ask people have you blipped in the last week, for example? I think and I hope in a way that social VR will really get out of momentum a year from now which will really ensure that VR will stay alive outside of the gaming industry. And also I do believe that we'll see a combination of VR and AR It just has to happen at some point, you know, just being able to just switch between the two experiences using one headset. I'd agree. I'd like to see that happen. It just seems like it'd be more of a heightened experience. I think what I would like to see is my parents live so far away and they're 80 years old and they're not going to be able to travel to Singapore and see my six and three year old sons at all. I would like to see it someday evolve to a point where they can import them more into that environment that my kids are in and they can realize that just how much they cause. But you know, experience that and rich sort of grow up with them, but they don't have that right now and they're not going to be able to travel over it. I think that's what VR could potentially be or AR could add to that as well. So that's my wish. If I had a wish, that would be maybe magic. Sure, I'd love to see that too, but that's number one. Get them here somehow. I want to thank the panelists and before we break there's some announcements I want to go through but can we give them a round of applause please? So again, thanks everyone gentlemen. Thanks so much for your opinions on this too as well. Some final notes. Again, thank you to the NUS Enterprise for again giving us this venue. Xperia Ventures is hosting a hackathon in partnership with National Computing Center. Anyone interested should reach out to Lee or Amy Doe for more information and I think they're in here or we'll be around. So Amy, if you're here, if you could raise your hand if you aren't, you'll have to hunt people down yourselves. Look for an announcement on the Facebook group page too as well. I think it's Madge's Institute of Excellence. Anyone from there? There we are. Which focuses on game design animation is launching a course on game development plus VR. MBA grants are available, correct? Speak to Alexander if you'd like more information after the session. He's right over there. Okay? Roy, where is Roy? Roy! Thank you for being so kind with the mic tonight. Roy has Google car boards, if anyone is interested too as well. And we're working on some other meetups too as well. Look for the, just follow their meetup board. Follow our Facebook group as well and I'm allowed to say that even if I work for Google. And again, final thanks to all our companies that are demoing tonight and thank you for your support. We'll see you hopefully in another month or two. Cheers.