Infinity AR: We'll fulfill sci-fi promise of augmented reality
An Israeli startup hopes to bring features like face detection, voice tone detection, coupons based on your interests and location to your smart glasses.
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Augmented reality has so far been mostly a sci-fi vision that overlays information from the virtual world atop what we see in the real world. An Israeli startup called Infinity Augmented Reality, though, wants to make a business of it.
In three to six months, Infinity AR plans to launch its app, called the Brain, for Google Glass; devices running Android, iOS, and Windows Phone; Microsoft Sync in cars; and perhaps most notably Meta's 3D augmented-reality glasses. The last example is closest to the science fiction vision of AR, where translucent information is merged with your full field of vision; Google Glass uses only a small screen that's above your regular line of sight.
The app will link back to Infinity AR servers that will handle the computing grunt work to enable various services, said Chief Executive Elon Landenberg. And it'll be free, since Infinity AR plans to make money by supplying ads deemed relevant to a person's changing interests.
"We are trying to develop the platform that uses augmented reality in the front end [devices people carry like phones or glasses] but uses artificial intelligence technology on the back end [the company's servers] to try to anticipate and understand what you need and what you want and then present it when you need it," Landenberg said.
Key to the company's sales pitch is making services that are useful -- and that go beyond existing ones like calendar notifications and the Google Now service for prompting people with information Google anticipates you'll want.
So what are those services exactly? Landenberg has several in mind to start with:
• Information about the mood of people you're talking to, based on their tone of voice.
• Face recognition of those around you, based on information those people have shared publicly already. Recognition isn't instant -- it takes about 30 seconds for a complete stranger and 5 seconds if only searching through a limited set of people such as a few hundred conference attendees. Depending on your mood, the software can tailor what it shows you.