Qualcomm introduces the Snapdragon Spaces XR platform for augmented reality developers | Immersive Technology

Qualcomm has released the Snapdragon Spaces XR developer platform recently. It is a revolutionary offering that allows application and game developers to create headworn augmented reality (AR) apps.

The software is currently available for download by developers. Qualcomm Ventures has also made a recent announcement regarding its investment in Tripp and Echo3D. These two companies are both makers of meditation applications. The money for these investments came from the Snapdragon Metaverse Fund, valued at $100 million.

The news came during the starting phase of the Augmented World Expo. It is a trade show conference being held in Santa Clara, California. Hugo Swart from Qualcomm is making an opening keynote speech at this event.

Snapdragon Spaces, which was unveiled late last year, provides advanced technologies as well as an accessible, cross-device platform and environment to bring creators’ visions for headworn augmented reality technology to reality.

Qualcomm Technologies intends to be a major player in the metaverse space by putting effort researching XR or extended reality technology. To start generating headworn augmented reality (AR) experiences on consumer-grade equipment, programmers can now acquire a hardware development package in conjunction with accessing Snapdragon Spaces. According to Qualcomm Technologies, these XR advances are starting points towards the metaverse.

Developers can begin their journey with Snapdragon Spaces by checking out the website spaces.qualcomm.com. Downloading the Snapdragon Spaces platform will enable users to gain access to useful components required for the development of three-dimensional applications for augmented reality glasses from scratch. They will also be able to incorporate AR features into two-dimensional Android apps.
According to a statement given by ForwARdgame CEO Tim Friedland, the company’s team has harnessed several different augmented reality offerings for Unity. He explained that whilst using Snapdragon Spaces, the requirements for changes were quite less compared to others, when it came to the conventional ARFoundation setup. It was useful in helping them build games like FlinkAAR, which showed people around the world how to participate in innovative virtual gameplay.

The road approaching headworn AR experiences that smoothly connect the gaps between the digital and physical domains is now becoming a possibility, Qualcomm claimed, with early access developers already working on Snapdragon Spaces and offering genuine insights.

Javier Davalos, XR lead at Overlay, said that the Snapdragon Spaces platform lets the company’s team leverage some user-friendly tools to expand the reach of its AR apps across a larger number of platforms. He also emphasised that there is a lot of excitement currently, in anticipation of witnessing what other developers will bring to the table.

The Snapdragon Spaces Pathfinder Program has financed its first batch of development initiatives, with the goal of assisting AR pioneers on this turning point of spatial computation. They will receive early-access interface technologies, development money, co-marketing opportunities, and hardware development kits as part of the initiative.

Arvizio, Flow Immersive, CareAR, Designium, Digital Dream Labs, Cognition Labs, Inception XR, Beatshapers, Holo-Light, Merge Labs, homeAR, Interwoven Worlds, MSM.digital, Trace 3d, Zoe Immersive and Neurolab are some 9f the recipients of the Pathfinder programme.