John Carmack, Oculus

Oculus acquires gesture-control firm

Trade
PIctured: John Carmack, Oculus. Source: PCWorld

17 July 2015

Facebook, owner of virtual reality gaming company Oculus, has inked a deal to buy gesture-control and computer-vision company Pebbles Interfaces.

Facebook announced that it will add the Israel-based company, its technology and its team to its Oculus team.

Pebbles, a five-year-old company, stated on its website that joining Oculus should help the combined team advance immersive user experiences and computer-human interactions.

“Through micro-optics and computer vision, we hope to improve the information that can be extracted from optical sensors, which will help take virtual reality to the next level,” said Nadav Grossinger, CTO of Pebbles Interfaces, in a written statement. “We’ve always believed visual computing will be the next major platform in our lifetime, and we’re excited to join the Oculus team to achieve that vision for the future.”

Facebook, which has kept a large section of its user base entertained with social games like Farmville and Candy Crush, dove deeper into the gaming world in March 2014 when it bought Oculus.

Even though Oculus hadn’t released Rift, its virtual reality headset, yet, Facebook still paid $2 billion for the company.

Oculus Rift is designed to give gamers a 100-degree 3D field of view.

This past May, Facebook and Oculus bought image recognition company Surreal Vision, which had been focused on recreating real-life scenes inside 3D environments.

Computerworld

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