From smartphones to MR headsets: The future answer of vivo

Smartphones Changed the Past, MR Headsets Are Reconstructing the Future

After smartphones have dominated the mobile internet for nearly 20 years, MR headsets have emerged as potential successors to the new generation of intelligent terminals.

Although the annual shipment of smartphones exceeds 1.2 billion units, making them the super terminals with the highest global market share and the broadest influence today, MR headsets are approaching the mainstream with a rapid growth momentum.

According to IDC data, the global shipment of intelligent headsets is expected to reach 12.8 million units in 2025, a year-on-year increase of 26%. In China, the world's largest single consumer market, the future growth rate will directly exceed three digits, reaching 107%.

If smartphones, as the gateway to the digital world, centered around the screen, have met our needs for information acquisition, communication, entertainment, payment, etc., then MR headsets "unlock" these capabilities into the real world, breaking through the limitations of the two-dimensional screen.

The digital life that a single screen can support has reached its peak. Smartphones have achieved the best in information, communication, entertainment, and payment, but they have always remained in the two-dimensional world. In MR headsets, scenarios such as office collaboration, immersive gaming, and spatial navigation are being reconstructed in a three-dimensional and panoramic way - this is the first time for users to "step into" the digital world.

On August 21st, the launch of the vivo Vision Explorer Edition was based on the extension of such usage scenarios and vivo's long-term accumulation in display, computing power, and interaction.

It is not an attempt to chase the trend but the next step that vivo has taken in line with the trend. As Hu Baishan, Executive Vice President, Chief Operating Officer, and Dean of vivo's Central Research Institute, said, "MR is the bridge connecting the physical world and the digital world."

vivo Vision Explorer Edition: Transforming MR Headsets from "Novelty" to "Regular Use"

In 2018, after the smartphone industry reached the peak of its dividend, the metaverse, as an industrial concept encompassing various emerging technologies, emerged. Tech giants such as Apple, Microsoft, Meta, and Google are all trying to seize the entrance to the next-generation computing platform.

However, as the first technology company in the Chinese domestic market to launch a consumer-grade headset, vivo, which has always taken user needs as the fulcrum of innovation, is well aware that these headset devices still face challenges in reaching users.

In the perception of the general public, headsets are still "bulky and of limited use" niche toys. The lightweight, all-day comfortable wearing experience and a content ecosystem that offers sufficient choices, which ordinary users expect, often have a huge gap with the current products on the market.

This is why even though tech giants have entered the market first, the experience of headset products still fails to meet the passing line for being useful or even regularly used.

The launch of the vivo Vision Explorer Edition, targeting the consumer-grade market, is precisely to solve this problem. By binding the MR headset with a home robot, it attempts to establish a rigid demand through diverse scenarios such as entertainment, office, and home.

In terms of appearance, the vivo Vision Explorer Edition resembles ski goggles, featuring a wraparound head-mounted structure and an integrated black mask design. The core computing unit is integrated into a small external box resembling a power bank, which can effectively reduce the burden on the wearer's head. Meanwhile, the vivo Vision Explorer Edition is also equipped with multiple cameras and sensors. As the core hardware of MR technology, they provide a hardware foundation for high-precision real-world environment capture and see-through effects.

In terms of lightweight design, which the industry focuses on the most, the vivo Vision Explorer Edition weighs only 398 grams. According to product manager Han Boxiao, this revolutionary wearing weight is close to that of Apple's over-ear headphones, the AirPods Max, basically marking the end of the bulky era of MR headset devices.

In terms of the core algorithm, vivo Vision uses the VST algorithm with a latency as low as 13ms. As the core technology of this headset, the VST algorithm optimizes the quality of the see-through picture, achieving a natural fusion of the real world and virtual information. In terms of color, brightness, picture distortion, latency, etc., it can almost synchronize with the real world quickly.

Finally, there is ecological interconnection. Users can use the vivo Vision Explorer Edition to view spatial photos and spatial videos taken by the vivo X200 Ultra, providing an immersive "return to the scene" experience.

By connecting devices and scenarios and giving users a reason to turn on the device "every day," the vivo Vision Explorer Edition is no longer just a flashy innovation at the product launch. It is a future intelligent terminal that solves users' pain points, gradually integrates into users' daily lives, and even forms a closed loop of content consumption.

As vivo, a Chinese technology company, envisions, in the future, smartphones will not disappear. Instead, it will be a full-scenario intelligent world where smartphones, MR devices, and robots coexist. The symbiotic relationship between these different intelligent terminals can meet users' more diverse needs in different scenarios.

With the Launch of vivo Vision, Initiate the "Right Thing" for the Next Decade

The value behind MR does not only lie in the display module or imaging technology. It is more like a systematic integration: imaging, large AI models, computing power, and the operating system work together. The launch of the vivo Vision Explorer Edition is a concentrated release of vivo's capabilities, based on its long-term imaging accumulation and algorithm optimization, combined with large model capabilities.

vivo's MR capabilities are particularly important at the current stage of robot implementation.

Currently, the development of robots is generally restricted by scenarios and data. Whether it is the logistics robots operating orderly in warehouses, the service robots delivering meals along specific routes in restaurants, or the sweeping robots in home scenarios, they can only operate in relatively closed and structured scenarios and have difficulty handling complex interactions in open and unstructured scenarios.

These restrictions highlight the rationality of traditional technology companies entering the robot field from the smartphone sector.

It should be noted that smartphones, often regarded as the "external organs" of humans, possess a large amount of users' physical data - from the number of steps taken to physiological information, from the interaction environment to imaging materials. These data not only reflect users' behaviors and living scenarios but also become the training materials for robots to understand the human environment.

This also means that vivo, as an intelligent terminal manufacturer, with its 500 million terminal users accumulated over the past 30 years and its profound algorithm advantages under the "Blue Technology" capability map, can provide a consumer-grade "testing ground" for the implementation of robot scenarios. In essence, through large-scale user data and scenario feedback, it forms a closed-loop iteration of algorithms and hardware, thereby accelerating the process of robots moving from the laboratory simulation scenario to the real and complex physical world.

As Hu Baishan mentioned in the meeting room, "We are committed to using smartphone AI, imaging, and MR capabilities to meet users' short-term needs for a large-screen immersive experience. In the long run, we aim to serve as the eyes and brain of robots, overcome the 'perception - decision-making' challenges in the unstructured home scenario, and build a bridge for future home robots to enter millions of households." Therefore, the launch of the vivo Vision Explorer Edition is not an action to "chase the trend" but a logical strategic extension of vivo.

Obviously, vivo is well-prepared. "vivo's strength lies in user insight, scenario recognition, and the definition of the gold standard; on the technical side, we also have profound reserves in key MR technology fields such as imaging capabilities and large AI models." In Hu Baishan's view, from MR to robots, this is the "right thing" that vivo has identified for the next 10 years.

Although it is still too early to say that robots will become the next-generation super terminals after smartphones and cars, the vivo Vision, as a phased achievement, has laid a key foundation for robots' spatial perception and interaction capabilities in restoring the physical world.

This is definitely not an overnight success. Whether it is MR headsets or robots, they are not terminal categories that can achieve high sales volume in one or two years. Instead, they are long-term tracks that require synchronous iteration of software and hardware, gradual maturity of the ecosystem, and continuous cultivation of user awareness.

On the one hand, the technology maturity curve is long. It usually takes 8 to 10 years of continuous iteration and verification from the laboratory prototype to a mature experience available to the general public, involving breakthroughs in multiple dimensions such as optics, computing power, algorithms, and interaction. On the other hand, the commercialization path is also extremely tortuous. Although vertical B2B scenarios such as industry, education, and healthcare are easier to implement, to reduce hardware costs and strengthen a rich content ecosystem, it is still necessary to enter the C2C consumer market.

More importantly, ecosystem construction requires time for cultivation, and no advanced computing platform can escape this rule. Just like the evolution process of the Android and iOS ecosystems from scratch, the MR ecosystem also requires continuous investment and co-construction. Hu Baishan also said in the meeting room: "No industry can be in a hurry. It needs to progress step by step. With a good hardware experience foundation, the ecosystem will form a positive cycle, and the industry will thrive."

Comparing with the cycles of other technology tracks, the PC, which emerged in the 1970s, and the smartphones, which entered the prosperous era in 2007, each change in the computing entrance has been an industrial cycle of more than a decade. This periodic change requires enterprises to have long-term strategic determination and endurance. Companies lacking continuous investment often have to withdraw midway due to short-term profit pressure or wavering in direction.

If competition is emphasized in the short term, then mutual prosperity is emphasized in the long term. The last question to answer is: As the first Chinese technology company to enter the MR headset market, what does the vivo Vision mean for the landscape of the Chinese technology industry?

Firstly, in the global context of technological innovation, vivo has enabled Chinese smartphone manufacturers to stand on the same starting line as tech giants such as Apple and Meta in the "next-generation computing platform" for the first time. By announcing the establishment of a robot laboratory this year, vivo has contributed Chinese wisdom and solutions to the domestic and even global MR industry.

Secondly, it will drive the rise of a brand - new industrial chain for intelligent terminals. MR headsets are not just a single piece of hardware but an integration of multiple industrial chain links such as algorithms, optics, display, interaction, AI computing, content ecosystem, and cross - terminal interconnection. This cross - field industrial collaboration ability can only be promoted by leading manufacturers like vivo with long - term accumulation.

Currently, vivo has built world - class supply chain integration capabilities, industrial design capabilities, and structural stacking optimization capabilities. In the MR and robot fields, vivo focuses on technology R & D and maintains full cooperation with industry partners in robot ontology. Meanwhile, in the content ecosystem, vivo Vision is striving to build an ecological experience that seamlessly connects with Android applications, achieving an ecological closed - loop.

This open - ended industrial cooperation reflects vivo's innovation values: not starting from "what we can do" but from "what users really need." Always building the industrial and content ecosystems around its own "capability circle" is the core value that vivo has adhered to for 30 years.

With long - term technology investment to form strategic endurance, open and mutually prosperous ecosystem co - construction to form industrial synergy, and user needs as the origin of innovation, vivo does not want to be just a competitor to Apple. Instead, at its 30th anniversary, it is initiating the "right thing" for the next decade.