Apple seems to be looking to join the gesture-technology movement with an acquisition of PrimeSense. Bloomberg Businessweek said it could not completely confirm the report of the acquisition because Apple, in typical Apple fashion, was extremely vague when asked for confirmation. News outlets in Israel, which is home to PrimeSense headquarters, broke the acquisition story.
PrimeSense hit the scene when Microsoft relied on the company’s hardware for the release of its Xbox Kinect. The Kinect was a gesture-sensing add-on for the Xbox 360 console, and was Microsoft’s response to the Nintendo Wii’s success. Microsoft has since moved on and incorporated hardware from Canesta, one of PrimeSense’s rivals, in its newest version of Kinect. Canesta reportedly has a reputation for its sophisticated gesture-recognition technology.
It will be interesting to see what Apple plans to do with PrimeSense. Apple is late to the gesture-sensing gaming console market. It also seems as though PrimeSense would not give Apple a technological advantage in the market either.
Bloomberg reported that PrimeSense has been developing depth-sensing technology that could open doors to the possibility of a 3D camera on a mobile phone. Apple seems to be a pioneer when it comes to camera phones, as it introduced panorama technology with its iPhone 5.
4 Comments
The future of this acquisition definitly depends on what Apple is intending to do with the technology. It will be interesting to see.
It would be interesting to see how PlayStation has gone about its sensing technology. PlayStation in the release of the PS4 came out ahead of Microsoft’s console. Apple has the sensing technology also in its new ipads to detect if you are looking at the screen.
This is definitely an interesting acquisition. I could definitely see it being useful in a bid to enter the gaming market, or in some kind of home system.
It doesn’t seem like Apple would use this acquisition to compete in the same way its competitors are — video games aren’t one of Apple’s products. Acquiring this company won’t be used to directly steal competitor’s demand.
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