Meta announces tools & partnerships to bring VR productivity & collaboration to businesses - Auganix

In Virtual Reality and Mixed Reality News

October 11, 2022 – Today astatine Connect 2022, Meta announced its all-new, precocious virtual world (VR) headset, Meta Quest Pro. The instrumentality is the archetypal successful the company’s caller enactment of high-end devices and Meta stated that it has been designed with collaboration and productivity successful mind.

The instrumentality utilizes cutting-edge exertion that Meta is hoping volition spur an improvement successful the mode radical work, specified as:

• Pancake optics for providing clearer visuals for speechmaking substance (like documents and emails) successful VR, with 75% much opposition than Meta Quest 2. Quest Pro has besides been slimmed down by 40% compared to Quest 2 acknowledgment to its caller pancake optics.
• Full-color mixed world that allows users to spot the carnal situation astir them, enabling them to multitask astatine a virtual enactment abstraction with virtual monitors placed close supra an existent table and alongside everything other successful the carnal workspace.
• Eye tracking and Natural Facial Expressions that let users’ avatars correspond them much people successful VR. These features, combined with manus tracking, let avatars to amusement non-verbal cues, allowing for greater connection and a greater consciousness of presence.
• A caller unfastened plan that allows wearers to usage their peripheral imaginativeness for greater consciousness of surroundings. The instrumentality besides features flexible levels of immersion via magnetic partial airy blockers that tin beryllium utilized to summation immersion for focused work.
• All caller controllers that see an added stylus extremity for earthy penning and sketching. The controllers are besides wholly self-tracked for a 360-degree scope of motion, designed to beryllium much balanced and ergonomic with precision gestures, and travel with upgraded haptics.

The caller Meta Quest Pro virtual and mixed world headset.

Meta stated that the Meta Quest Pro has been built with radical similar architects, engineers, builders, creators and designers successful mind. Meta is anticipating that implicit the agelong term, Quest Pro volition assistance to unlock a scope of caller ways to acquisition and amended workflows crossed galore antithetic industries and the enterprise.

Meta Horizon Workrooms

Last year, Meta announced the beta of Meta Horizon Workrooms, the company’s VR abstraction for teams to link and collaborate. Now, Meta is adding a bid of caller Workrooms features that person been purposefully built and optimized for the Meta Quest Pro:

• More expressive and lifelike avatars that are generated successful existent clip by utilizing the Quest Pro’s inward-facing sensors that powerfulness oculus tracking and Natural Facial Expressions features;
• Breakout groups person been introduced, enabling teams to displacement from a large radical presumption into smaller discussions successful the aforesaid country for much progressive brainstorming. Spatial audio besides allows users to perceive a breakout radical clearly, but inactive perceive the ambient discussions successful the remainder of the room, with little distraction;
• Persistent sticky notes for whiteboard, for brainstorming and collaborating that volition each inactive beryllium determination the adjacent clip anyone connected a squad logs successful to the aforesaid Workroom;
• Updates to the solo Workrooms acquisition with the quality to spawn 3 monolithic virtual screens implicit a user’s desk, arsenic good arsenic 4 types of idiosyncratic environments (or offices). Combined with colour passthrough, the institution hopes that these changes volition crook the Quest Pro headset into a portable office;
• Zoom integration that volition let users to articulation Workrooms via Zoom, coming aboriginal 2023;
• The enactment to presumption 3D models successful Workrooms volition beryllium launched adjacent year.
• Magic Room is simply a mixed world acquisition that volition fto immoderate premix of people, immoderate unneurotic successful a carnal country and immoderate remote, collaborate together. Meta is already experimenting with Magic Rooms itself, and stated that it hopes to marque the acquisition wide disposable adjacent year.

Partnership with Microsoft

At Connect today, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was joined by Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella, and the 2 shared their plans to accelerate the aboriginal of work. Through a concern with Microsoft, the companies volition bring almighty caller enactment and productivity tools to Meta Quest Pro and Meta Quest 2, including:

• Microsoft Teams immersive gathering experiences for Meta Quest;
• Microsoft Windows 365 for Meta Quest that volition let users to watercourse Windows connected Meta Quest Pro and Meta Quest 2 devices, and entree their personalized apps, content, and settings successful VR;
• Microsoft 365 app experiences for Meta Quest that volition let users to interact with 2D contented from Sharepoint, Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook straight from Meta Quest Pro and Meta Quest 2;
• Microsoft Teams/Workrooms integration;
• Meta Avatars successful Microsoft Teams;
• Microsoft Intune and Azure Active Directory enactment for Meta Quest for endeavor information and absorption connected Meta Quest Pro and Meta Quest 2 devices.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella.

Partnership with Accenture

Zuckerberg was besides joined by Accenture Chair and CEO Julie Sweet, who revealed that the planetary nonrecreational services institution is teaming up with Meta and Microsoft to assistance businesses astir the satellite make caller experiences that accelerate the aboriginal of work.

According to the companies, implicit the past year, Accenture deployed 60,000 Meta Quest 2 headsets and transformed its onboarding process, welcoming 150,000 radical successful its “Nth Floor” virtual field that was co-created with Microsoft.

Accenture volition beryllium moving alongside Meta and Microsoft successful the coming twelvemonth to assistance companies usage VR to alteration the mode they prosecute employees, interact with customers, oregon make products and services successful the metaverse.

As portion of the partnership, Meta besides announced that it volition beryllium accepting caller applications for its Independent Software Vendor Program to grow its ecosystem for businesses.

Other partnerships

Meta stated that implicit the past twelvemonth it has been moving with dozens of partners to make caller experiences for radical looking to get things done successful VR and beyond. Other partners see Autodesk, which is updating its collaborative plan reappraisal app to instrumentality vantage of the caller possibilities unlocked by Meta Quest Pro. This volition springiness architects and designers a caller mode of reviewing 3D models immersively.

Adobe is different partner, and adjacent twelvemonth Adobe’s Substance 3D apps for nonrecreational 3D creators, designers, and artists are coming to Meta Quest Pro and Meta Quest 2, enabling anyone to exemplary 3D objects and articulation collaborative reviews wrong VR. Furthermore, Adobe Acrobat volition besides beryllium coming to the Meta Quest Store, enabling PDF papers viewing, editing, and collaboration.

Hybrid squad collaboration connected the Meta Quest platform.

Meta Quest for Business

Meta stated that 1 cardinal portion of being capable to standard VR successful the workplace is to guarantee businesses tin easy deploy and negociate devices crossed their workforce. As a result, the institution has stated that adjacent twelvemonth it volition motorboat Meta Quest for Business, a subscription bundle for Meta Quest Pro and Meta Quest 2 that volition see indispensable admin features similar instrumentality and exertion management, premium support, and more.

The level volition besides unlock entree to Microsoft Intune and Azure Active Directory, providing companies that privation the information and absorption options they expect from PCs and mobile devices to beryllium disposable successful VR should they proviso Meta Quest devices.

For the afloat station from Meta, click here.

Image / video credit: Meta / YouTube