The iPhone company is reportedly planning to announce the release of one of its most widely-awaited products – a mixed-reality device – later in the spring of this year and this could be a big moment for the gaming industry.
Apple is known for being both a disruptor and a pioneer in the markets it enters. Some examples include the music industry, where it changed how consumers listened to their favorite songs with the introduction of the iPod and later on through its music marketplace iTunes.
Meanwhile, Apple has also set the standard in the personal computer market by creating devices that can perform better than any other and that are heavily protected against malicious software.
This time, Apple is preparing to launch a device called the Reality Pro, a high-performance augmented-reality (AR) gadget that will come to compete with the Quest Pro 2 from Meta Platforms.
According to tech journalist Mark Gurman from Bloomberg, the new device should be officially presented during the spring season and just before the Worldwide Developers Conference, which is scheduled to take place in June. Meanwhile, the device could be shipped to customers in the fall.
Apple has reportedly approached an exclusive group of software engineers who will be testing the firm’s AR/VR operating system – xrOS – so they can start working on third-party apps for the Reality Pro.
Tim Cook is All-In on AR/VR, Not the Metaverse
The Chief Executive Officer of the Cupertino-based tech firm, Tim Cook, has recently made comments about his firm’s ambitions in the AR/VR industry specifically and has deemed it as a more promising feel than the heavily-touted metaverse.
“I think AR is a profound technology that will affect everything. Imagine being able to suddenly teach with AR and demonstrate things that way. Or medically, and so on. Like I said, we are really going to look back and think how we once lived without AR”, he told students in an event that took place at the University of Naples Federico II.
The Reality Pro will probably be built so it can be synchronized with most other Apple devices such as the iPhone and iWatch so users can make the most out of the data collected by these gadgets to personalize their experience.
This year may not be the flashiest for Apple in terms of new product releases as fears of an upcoming global economic slowdown have prompted the senior management to cut the budget of certain projects.
However, experts from the tech industry believe that the new lineup of iPhones could feature some impressive hardware changes including a long-awaited transition to USB-C charging ports and faster processors.
Apple Could Soon Replace Components from Broadcom and Qualcomm
Apple (AAPL) has also been working on becoming less dependent on third-party suppliers when it comes to hardware. According to market chatter, the company could be planning to manufacture its own Bluetooth and Wi-Fi components in replacement of the devices’ Broadcom chips.
The report from Bloomberg indicated that Apple is Broadcom’s largest customer at the moment as the company founded by Steve Jobs accounted for 20% of the semiconductors business’s revenue as of its last fiscal year.
Qualcomm’s components may soon be replaced by Apple’s in-house chips. In the case of the latter, sales to the iPhone maker accounted for 22% of its annual top line. These changes are expected to be made one or two years from now according to the sources cited in the article.
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