Nreal currently focusing on Asia, shipping to the West is coming next year

I have said it multiple times: Nreal is one of the most intriguing AR startups out there. With its lightweight, fashionable and affordable glasses, it has set a new trend for AR, that now many companies are trying to follow. It is the AR glass to buy for many consumer and enterprise applications, but the big problem is that it has become hard to buy. Let me tell you what is happening and what is the answer from the company about this situation.

Nreal is having delays

I have a Nreal devkit, that I have reviewed and I have personally appreciated. For a consultancy project, some weeks ago, I had to buy some units, so I contacted my friends at Nreal and FXG and they told me that the devices were not available for purchase. I insisted that it was a very good business opportunity, but the company didn’t want to help me the same.

This is very strange, because if you know the Chinese mentality, you surely know that Chinese people do whatever they can to get a new customer (the competition is very fierce there), and it is weird that they let an opportunity go wasted that easily.

Speaking with other friends all over the world, I noticed that this was a very common problem: it seems that finding an Nreal Light device has been so hard as finding the Sacred Grail. Developers that have preordered it have not received it yet, companies thinking about using it for some AR projects have been told the device can’t be ordered yet, and so on. But while many people were still waiting for their device, Nreal announced the start of the sales in Korea together with LG: a very successful campaign, that in just some days let Nreal sell more than 1000 devices. The situation is pretty confusing and also some strange things are happening: the tweet announcing the 1000 devices sold has been canceled soon after the publication, for instance; people that preordered the device and have not received it, still receive e-mail marketing communications from Nreal that invites them to buy the Nreal Light.

So what is happening?

Nreal answers it is focusing on Asia

I’ve asked my contacts at Nreal to explain to me the current situation, and the answer I got is that now they’re mostly focusing on the partnership with LG and the Asian market. At first China, then Korea and the next month they will also launch in Japan. This plan has been confirmed to me also by another independent source.

The company is very sorry for the delays and it says it is doing its best to meet its goals. After the launch in Japan, they’re finally come back to us 老外, targeting at first Europe and then the US (For once, strangely US is the last country receiving a tech device…). We can expect this to happen in 2021. So whoever of you has preordered a Nreal Light glass or plans to buy one must wait till next year to receive its device.

As for the delays, the company says that of course the coronavirus has had its impact, but now the cause is mostly the demand being much higher than expected and the production not being able to cope with that. This is the official answer provided me from a spokesperson of the company:

Thank you so much for this opportunity to clarify. First of all, […] the fact that we sold more than our stated 1000, [is] the reason [why] we retracted the Tweet. I guess that’s another way of saying we’ve been caught off guard by the popularity as the demand is stronger than anticipated. This has put a strain on our available units and that is what is in fact causing the delays. We’re working our hardest to satisfy all demand and set up to meet past and future demand.

Basically, Nreal is in the same position as Valve and Facebook: it is having a too high demand for its device, and it can’t keep pace with its production. It is even in a worse position than Valve and Facebook, because it is a newer and smaller company, so it is difficult for it to create a solid production pipeline. Hardware is very hard to make, and creating a production pipeline for a worldwide distribution is very hard: that’s why Valve partnered with HTC for the first Vive, because HTC had this kind of knowledge. Now that Valve is alone, it is having much more troubles in manufacturing and distributing the Index. And this is also why Pimax is having issues and why the new DecaGear will have exactly the same problems. Managing a hardware product is very complicated.

Someone asked me if Nreal may be a scam. Until now, I heard no rumors about this, not even from my friends in China. And having tried the devkit myself, I can assure you that the project, at least from a hardware standpoint, is there. Also, the sale in Korea is real. People from the company still answer me on WeChat, so the support is alive. My current standing is that the company is a believable one. Their only problem, as I have written above, is that they are having problems with the “execution”.

Nreal is a great device, and especially it is buidling a very good ecosystem around it (with partnerships with 7Invensun, Clay AIR, 6d.ai, etc…) so it is normal that many people and companies want it. But the startup has still to learn how to create the production process to satisfy everyone. And so now it is moving slowly, starting from its own country China, then expanding to nearby countries, also thanks to the help of LG, and then going overseas. This is the right approach to take, so they gradually expand their reach in a manageable way. The problem is that they should have realized this far before opening the preorders in the West.

You may think that you can go buy a Korean Nreal if you need it. But actually, this doesn’t work: you would need a LG phone with a Korean SIM. And honestly speaking, two sources have confirmed to me that the device is so requested that is even hard to find in China and Korea. So the only solution is to wait.

Nreal is now mostly focusing on devs and consumers. Regarding enterprises wanting to use Nreal for their projects, another external source told me that some companies have been told that proper business-oriented distribution of Nreal glasses in Europe and US, with accompanying B2B services, should be expected for late 2021 or even 2022, but I had no official confirmation on this.

So what to do if you need a Nreal glass now?

I appreciate the effort that Nreal is performing to fulfill its promises, but the reality is that now it is hard to get your hands on one of its devices. So, what to do if you need a Nreal Glass now? What if you need it for an enterprise project of yours, or to create a POC for a customer or a grant?

My suggestion is:

• If you have preordered a device and you are very angry you haven’t received it yet you can ask for a refund. Reading around on Reddit, Nreal support is pretty active and responsive and it will offer you a refund without problems;
• If you can wait for your headset, just sit down and wait until the headset becomes available again. Most probably this will take some months, but the reward will be a very high quality headset;
• If you need an AR headset now, switch to a competing device. Nreal is an excellent company, but for most projects (especially if they are POCs), even a slightly less performant headset may do the job. Currently, apart from the famous Hololens 2 and Magic Leap, I am evaluating brands like Rokid, Shadow Creator, Nueyes, and Pacific Future. If you are interested in my findings, you can contact me in private.

As always, I’ll keep you posted on the situation of Nreal. If you don’t want to miss the updates, please subscribe to my newsletter 😉