According to HTC’s CFO, the VR product isn’t just another "a phone slapped onto a headset."
HTC’s chief financial officer, Chia-lin Chang, has confirmed that the company is working on a new virtual reality headset for 2017, however, he also distinguished the product as “a different thing.” That could be a hint that the VR product would may not be a successor of the HTC Vive. In fact, Chang says HTC is ready to position itself as “a VR company.”
While Chang already called it a “different thing”, he stresses over the uniqueness of the new product by saying that it won’t just be “a phone slapped onto a headset.” Chang didn’t disclose how the new HTC VR will work but it’s being speculated that it will be similar to the LG 360 VR. In this arrangement, the smartphone is connected to the VR headset through a USB Type-C cable. He also pointed out the the device will be compatible with HTC’s latest U series of smartphones.
HTC U Ultra and HTC U Play are the company’s new premium smartphones that it introduced in 2017, and presumingly the new VR device will be made to compliment the series as well. While the two HTC smartphone are not yet available in India, they are expected to be released in the country in a few weeks now. Although the devices have been already launched abroad.
HTC’s big plans for the VR comes amid the company’s sluggish revenue reports. The company has just reported an operating loss of about $116 million, suffering a revenue dip of 14 percent. The loss comes despite what it calls “robust sales performance.” That said, HTC may not have done very well in the smartphones category but its HTC Vive VR headset had recieved wide positive response. The Vive takes on Facebook’s Oculus Rift and Sony’s Playstation VR. ALSO READ: Alleged HTC Vive smartphone leaked via promotional video
HTC in its latest financial report had said that it is now ramping up its virtual reality business. Last year, the company introduced a VR app store for smartphones, called Vivesport M, in China. Interestingly, there was a leaked concept video of a smartphone with Vive branding, though HTC doesn’t seem likely to execute the concept anytime sooner.
Going forward, HTC will be competing against a range of new generation VR devices. Already, smartphone giant Samsung has been targeting the segment with Gear VR that is compatible with the Galaxy S6, Galaxy Note 5 and the Galaxy S7 smartphones. Google is also betting big on this segment as it has baked a virtual reality platform, DayDream, right into the latest Android iteration, Nougat. Some of the smartphones that support Google’s DayDream platform are the Google Pixel, ZTE Axon 7 and Motorola Moto Z. ALSO READ: HTC has got it all wrong with the U Ultra and I’m not surprised