SHANGHAI — Nreal, a Chinese language firm making glasses for so-called augmented actuality experiences, is trying to go public inside 5 years, its CEO instructed CNBC.
“We’re pondering that is actually a serious tech market and actually trying ahead to what is going on to occur within the subsequent 10 to fifteen years. Very thrilling – I believe its extra like ’06, ’07 of the smartphone enterprise,” Chi Xu, CEO of Nreal mentioned.
“We see a whole lot of good alternatives and, positively, we’re pondering the market measurement goes to be large. And we’ve got this chance and we wish to take this to the ultimate finish.”
He mentioned an preliminary public providing may are available “lower than 5 years.”
The corporate’s flagship product is a pair of light-weight glasses known as Nreal Gentle, which has been launched in a handful of markets together with South Korea and Japan. Nreal says its glasses permit customers to expertise “blended actuality” the place digital photographs are superimposed over the actual world.
The Nreal Gentle connects to a smartphone. One of many quick makes use of frees individuals from being tied to their small smartphone screens.
“No matter you are displaying within the cellphone display screen in entrance of you, you place that in entrance of your face, into a large display screen, and that may be 3D, that may be ultra-high definition,” Xu mentioned.
An attendee tries a pair of Nreal mixed-reality glasses on the MWC Shanghai exhibition in Shanghai, China, on Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2021.
Qilai Shen | Bloomberg | Getty Pictures
Nreal’s ambitions pit it towards expertise giants that see a vivid future in augmented actuality. Apple CEO Tim Cook dinner has known as AR the “subsequent massive factor” and the iPhone large is reportedly engaged on a headset. Fb, Microsoft, Google and different expertise corporations are all investing in AR.
However present headsets available on the market are costly and sometimes cumbersome. Nreal is hoping its moveable nature will enchantment to shoppers. The worth varies by market relying on how it’s distributed. For instance, in Japan the headset prices round $700. However in South Korea, the system might be bought via a telecom operator’s plan which subsidizes the headset to round $300.
Enterprise mannequin
Nreal has a platform for builders to create apps for the headset’s working system known as Nebula.
“It is similar to what Apple has been doing for smartphone,” Xu mentioned. “We provide a platform the place individuals use that for various sorts of experiences and builders — they’ll deploy, they’ll develop completely different content material onto the sector.”
Apple not solely makes cash from gross sales of its iPhones and different {hardware} but it surely additionally will get income from commissions off its App Retailer.
Nreal has some notable backers. Kuaishou, the short-video platform in China and iQiyi, a video streaming service, are among the many firm’s traders. Xu mentioned Nreal can be working with each Kuaishou and iQiyi.
“As we talked about, not solely are we going to offer the {hardware}. We wish to bundle completely different companies with the glasses. So take video for instance, whether or not it is a lengthy video or brief video. We’re pondering glasses are a significantly better terminal to expertise the video in,” the CEO mentioned.
“In order that’s why we’ll be working with these giants, actually engaged on the brand new interface.”
