Facebook's Big Push Into Augmented Reality

With the launch of the 10th anniversary iPhone 8 just months away, Apple Inc. AAPL investors are anticipating the integration of new augmented reality technology into the landmark iPhone device. While the next step in AR will likely be integration with smart phones, Loup Ventures analyst Andrew Murphy expects augmented and virtual reality will eventually replace smartphones completely.

Beyond Reality

Facebook Inc FB CEO Mark Zuckerberg explained the trend away from physical devices in a recent interview following Facebook’s F8 conference.

“Think about how many of the things you use [that] don’t actually need to be physical. You want to play a board game? You snap your fingers, and here’s the board game. You want to watch TV? You don’t need a physical hardware TV, you buy a one-dollar app ‘TV’ and put it on the wall,” Zuckerberg said.

Murphy says AR will certainly be a big growth source in the next decade, but it is simply a transitional stage to VR technology.

“If you look out further than that, perhaps 30+ years, the immersiveness of VR has the potential to be so good that it rivals base reality,” Murphy explained.

“If VR can create alternate worlds as rich as the real one, we think the opportunity would surpass anything humans have created to date.”

For investors looking for the leading names in AR technology development, Apple, Alphabet Inc GOOG GOOGL and Facebook top Loup’s list of companies devoting the most money to AR research and development in 2017.

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