Hardware is an important part of the virtual reality market as consumers will need equipment that is capable of immersing them into VR experiences, but the software is equally important as without it, consumers would have no content to immerse themselves in. Samsung is one of the leading companies in the space with the Gear VR headset, but they want to be much more involved in the VR space than they are currently, which is as a manufacturer who produces VR hardware. To become more involved in the virtual reality market, Samsung has plans to jump into VR software as their next push, as they announced intentions for furthering their VR development at their annual developer conference today.
Part of how Samsung will expand their VR empire is with the soon-to-be-released Gear 360 camera, a device which they unveiled back at Mobile World Congress which is capable of recording video in 360-degrees, and that content will be viewable on Gear VR headsets, allowing viewers to feel like they’re actually part of what’s currently happening in the video. Beyond this, though, Samsung is working with VR developers to create and strengthen partnerships which can help to bring more VR content to the platform.
Samsung is also developing VR software themselves. The software, which will allow them to embed the MilkVR video player will be compatible with the Gear 360 camera, which consumers will be able to use or recording 360-degree videos which they can then take and upload to the MilkVR site on a dedicated channel. Samsung is wise to look at VR from every angle they possibly can as the VR space for media is still new. Despite its infancy, though, Samsung knows that VR content is popular with consumers, having just announced earlier that Gear VR owners have already spent over 2 million hours viewing VR content with the headset. Aside from getting into the software side of VR more on their own, Samsung is also looking to gather more content from third-party developers, having just recently handed out free Galaxy smartphones and a free Gear VR headset to the developers of Facebook’s F8 development team.