Aussie 3D startup JigSpace stars in Apple’s massive Vision Pro AR headset announcement

Overnight Apple held its annual World Wide Developer Conference (WWDC), with the biggest announcement being its new mixed reality headset, the Vision Pro. While we won’t see it on shelves for a little while, it offers a suite of use cases for work and business use. It also happened to feature Australian augmented reality (AR) startup, JigSpace during the keynote presentation.

AR and VR headsets have been around for a while now, particularly in the video game space. And during that time there has been a fair amount of work going into branching this technology out for workplace applications.

All the while Apple has been relatively quiet on the subject, which is standard for the tech giant. Apple tends to let other companies introduce new hardware to the market while it works to refine and perfect the problems that arise in the background. Or to use startup language, it offers innovation when it finally releases its own iteration.

It’s why we haven’t seen a foldable phone from Apple yet. But when we do, you can bet it will be a vision.

This means that now that it is entering the space officially, there are a plethora of startups and developers it can work with to bring onto the platform.

JigSpace is one of them, with its F1 Alfa Romeo collaboration being featured during the Vision Pro announcement early this morning.

Apple is referring to the Vision Pro not as a headset, but as a spatial computer that offers a 3D interface and no need for physical monitors or displays, thanks to its proprietary VisionOS interface.

According to Apple, this allows for “an infinite canvas for apps at work and at home”.

“visionOS features a three-dimensional interface that frees apps from the boundaries of a display so they can appear side by side at any scale. Apple Vision Pro enables users to be even more productive, with infinite screen real estate, access to their favourite apps, and all-new ways to multitask,” Apple said in a press release.

“And with support for Magic Keyboard and Magic Trackpad, users can set up the perfect workspace or bring the powerful capabilities of their Mac into Vision Pro wirelessly, creating an enormous, private, and portable 4K display with incredibly crisp text.”

In terms of how it’s controlled, unlike other headsets, there are no hand controllers. Instead, users utilise gesture controls from fingers and eye movements to move through and control their virtual space.

You’re also able to set the amount of space the digital screen takes up, as well as how much pass-through you want. In other words, how much of the physical room around do you still want to see.

The device itself contains Apple’s brand new R1 chip, an M2 chip, 12 cameras, six microphones, and five sensors.

In addition to general work productivity, Apple is also pitching this as a device to take business calls via 3D avatars.

“What a moment for JigSpace, being featured by Apple at the launch of the Vision Pro. Huge for the Aussie startup,” co-founder and managing partner of Rampersand VC, Paul Naphtali, said on LinkedIn.

And more generally, a massive moment for AR. The Vision Pro looks incredible, a whole new computing platform. A game changer for both business and entertainment.”

Back in 2021, JigSpace raised $6 million in Series A for its AR presentation platform. Apple entering the space seems like the perfect opportunity to scale its tech offerings even further. Ecosystem streamlining is something it has a consistent track record with.

“Within three days, we had something up and running,” JigSpace CEO and co-founder Zac Duff, said after three days of developing Apple’s SwiftUI, which allows for cross-platform support and development within the Apple ecosystem.

“He’d just be out there, learning everything he could, playing with Swift Playgrounds, and then he’d come back the next day and go: ‘Oh, boy, you won’t believe how powerful this thing is,’” Duff said of co-founder Numa Bertron.

JigSpace may be new to SwiftUI, but it has been using Apple-powered AR via its phone and iPad apps. On the Vision Pro it, and other companies in the space, will be able to take this a step further by building custom gestures and Spatial Personas to scale the product for 3D use.

“It’s a fundamental rethink of how people interact together around knowledge,” Duff said.

“Now, we can just have you experience something right in front of you. And not only that — you can bring other people into that experience, and it becomes much more about having all the right people in the room with you.”

But before you get too excited, we don’t know when we’re going to see the Vision Pro. At this stage, it has been slated for a US release in early 2024, with some other countries to follow later that year.

What we do know is that it’ll cost you, with the price tag currently sitting at US$3,500 (approx AU$5288). On the plus side, that gives you plenty of time to work out how to justify that particularly shiny business expense.