I’m going to Vive Ecosystem Conference!

In the last three weeks, you haven’t heard that much from me: I have written very few articles (it’s like two weeks that I don’t write a post on this blog), I have posted very little on social media and I have answered people always with days of delays. You may have wondered what was happening to me and the answer is: I was preparing for going to Vive Ecosystem Conference 2019!

Vive Ecosystem Conference is maybe the most important yearly event for HTC Vive: it is a bit like the Chinese equivalent of the Oculus Connect. Last year, during the VEC, HTC presented its new flagship phone, the HTC U12+, a lot of improvements to the Vive Focus, and some new partnerships. This year, the event will be held on March, 26th in Shenzhen, China.

What can we expect from this year? Well, of course, we don’t know, but if I had to speculate, I would say:

• The official launch of the Vive Focus Plus;
• The launch of a new HTC 5G flagship phone, that will be able to power the Vive Cosmos;
• Some new info on the Cosmos;
• Some ecosystem improvements, like for instance new features for the Vive Wave SDK;
• New partnerships for HTC;
• A lot of demos of the Vive Focus Plus, Vive Pro Eye and 5G stuff.

So, it seems that it will be a super cool event.

What I am going to be there and why I spent so much time in the last weeks preparing for it?

Well, I can’t tell you the whole story now, but… first of all I am going there with a content of mine, or to say it better, with a content of ours. We at New Technology Walkers with the collaboration of Enea Le Fons, have spent the last month and a half to develop a little 6 DOF game for the Vive Focus.

During this time, we had all the bad luck possible (more on this in the post mortem that I will publish after the VEC), but we managed to complete a good demo nonetheless. The game has absorbed all of our energies in the last days and that’s why I disappeared from the web lately. Anyway, it was completely worth it: HTC has approved it and it will be showcased in the demo area of the VEC and we are all super proud of this. For the first time in our lives, a content of ours will be showcased in one of the major worldwide XR events… isn’t it incredible?

I can’t tell that much about the game now… I will just tell you that it is a bit inspired by a content that I, Max Ariani and Viktor Pukhov developed at the times of my startup Immotionar… You will discover all the rest at VEC!

Presenting a demo is already super-cool, but there is even more: I will also have a speech there! During the afternoon of the event, I will have a talk on stage about Mixed Reality on the Vive Focus and Vive Focus Plus. You know that I like experimenting with pass through AR and MR on the Focus and I will talk exactly about that on stage. HTC asked me if I wanted to speak in English or in Chinese: a part of me really wanted to try speaking in Chinese, but then I imagined all the audience with a puzzled face not understanding a word of what I was saying and so I chose to speak in English. I mean, for sure I will try to say some sentences in Mandarin, but performing all the speech in Chinese I would have risked looking like Sheldon that speaks Mandarin in that famous episode of Big Bang Theory…

And then… well, I hope to meet some cool Chinese XR people that I only know virtually, like Diego from PanguVR or Ayden from VeeR, and also meet again my friends at 7invensun. I also hope to meet new people from Chinese companies like Pico, Shadow Creator, etc…

I hope to be able to perform some interesting interviews and hands-on sessions with all the newest HTC’s technologies. I will try to record the most that I will be able to.

And then, last but not least, I will meet again Mister President! This is worth alone the price of the airplane ticket… I hope he will inspire me like it has happened last time one year ago.

I am really so excited about what is going to happen. It is the biggest XR event I have attended in my life and I’m going there with a demo and a talk… wow! I really want to thank Alvin Wang Graylin for the opportunity, and Teresa, Jun, Bill and Leo for helping me in organizing all of this! Also, Miss S was fundamental to have the 6 DOF controllers, so a special thanks to her, too.

I will spend 5 days in Shenzhen, and I hope also to enjoy the city and some Chinese food. If you will be there, let me know, so maybe we’ll be able to meet in the Far East and talk about VR!

我特别激动！我很期待参加 HTC VIVE 新生态大会暨新品发布 ！！！我也希望我们可以在深圳见面！耶！