As a mage, I just want to pursue the truth

Chapter 301 Collaboration in Augmented Reality

In fact, this is just Gates' humble statement. When Microsoft chose to cooperate with Kechuang Future, it had new ideas.

Or it could be a sleight of hand.

Especially after the launch of Huanyu-Pengcheng, Microsoft's product ideas about what type of products it will make in the Metaverse era have become clearer.

The Internet industry has always been severely criticized for copying and plagiarizing in China.

But in fact, the spirit of the Internet when it was first invented was open source sharing.

It can be traced back to the 1950s and 1960s when IBM released operating systems and other programs and shared the source code of these programs.

At that time, there was also a SHARE user group specifically established for open source software sharing.

Later, the launch of the free software movement made the term open source widely used.

The phenomenon of creative plagiarism caused by the original spiritual core is not only serious in China, but also in America, the birthplace of the Internet.

For example, Apple sued Microsoft in the early days, claiming that Microsoft had plagiarized their ideas about the graphical operating interface.

After ICQ became popular, not only Tencent borrowed this idea, but Microsoft's MSN also borrowed this idea.

Even IBM has launched its own instant messaging software, but few people have used it, called IBM Lotus Sametime.

Of course, some people will say that MSN was founded in 1995, while ICQ’s parent company was not established until July 1996.

First there was ICQ and then there was Mirabilis. And MSN, which came out in 1995, was mainly an Internet service provider, not an instant messaging software.

It was not until ICQ became popular that MSN gradually developed its chat function.

Including Zuckerberg who later widely plagiarized and borrowed other people's ideas. Facebook was originally based on borrowing other people's ideas.

Similar things are happening all the time in America.

The problem with China's Internet industry is not copying ideas.

Rather, it lies in what these Internet companies did after they successfully took advantage of China's protection of its own Internet industry and its localization advantages.

After successfully accumulating a large number of users and completing their initial accumulation after going public, most Internet companies want to learn from the success of Tencent and Ali.

They hope to become the Internet landlords in the cyber age rather than make technological breakthroughs. There are few contributions from Chinese companies in many basic application key technologies.

In the early days, because Microsoft was the most successful company in the world and the most famous Internet company, the story of Bill Gates dropping out of school to start a business was famous all over the world.

Therefore, in the twenty years from 1996 to 2016, entrepreneurship in China's Internet industry was mainly in the software industry.

The success of Tencent and Ali has further fueled this trend.

Later, the popularity of Apple and smartphones led many people to start businesses in the hardware field.

After brain-computer VR became popular, Internet practitioners are the most sensitive to the trend.

Everyone realizes that they cannot compete with Science and Technology Future in the hardware field. Brain-computer connection technology alone cannot be achieved with money.

But the software field is okay. The entrepreneurial opportunities in the software field of brain-computer connection VR are comparable to the opportunities of the mobile Internet wave back then.

Douyin’s VR live broadcast revenue exceeded the amount of rewards for ordinary live broadcasts as early as 2025.

Many optical manufacturers have increased their R&D investment in the field of VR cameras.

Therefore, the VR software field has seen a large influx of capital, and previous Internet companies have also increased their investment in this field.

Microsoft is no exception. It was a giant in the PC era and a loser in the mobile Internet era.

The failure of the Symbian system in the competition with Android was a huge blow to Microsoft.

They missed an era. Bill Gates said in a dull tone in front of Zheng Li that when virtual reality is realized, it will be the end of Microsoft.

It's a performance but there's also some truth in it. In fact, Microsoft has never given up hope of making a comeback in the Metaverse era.

But if Microsoft's attempt in the new era fails again, then the future they face will indeed be bleak.

If you can’t build a system, then build applications based on the system level and build applications that can be widely used.

Microsoft's target of reference is Huanyu Pengcheng, and they also plan to build a similar ecosystem.

However, Microsoft plans to create a free user space and application based on the game "Minecraft" that is completely different from Tencent's.

"Minecraft" has richer playability in the VR field and greater room for development. It is the trump card that Microsoft has always held in its hand.

If you can't make a system, then make irreplaceable software. This is how Microsoft plans to deal with the new era.

Huanyu-Pengcheng, launched by Tencent, is very profitable, but it also has to face countless powerful competitors.

This is like Genshin Impact making huge money all over the world, attracting countless game manufacturers who want to make works of similar style to get a piece of the pie.

Zheng Li and Gates also talked about the authorization of industrial VR. Regarding this technology, the Chinese government has banned the export of this technology.

Zheng Li has a natural excuse to attribute the issue to policy factors, which make it impossible to authorize external parties.

Microsoft's earliest entry into the industrial VR field can be traced back to the HoloLens augmented reality headset released at the Windows 2015 conference in 10.

Later, Microsoft continued to invest in the field of industrial VR, and its HoloLens series of headsets has been released to the fifth generation.

According to Microsoft's official announcement, the cooperation with Lockheed Martin will increase the company's manufacturing and assembly efficiency by 90 percent.

Brain-computer connection technology is also a dimensionality reduction attack on the industrial VR field. For Microsoft, which has been committed to this field for a long time, they are extremely eager to obtain the authorization of this technology.

So much so that Gates asked: "If we can successfully lobby the Chinese government, are you willing to license brain-computer connection technology?
We can adopt the same cooperation approach as that of Kechuang Biotechnology and other Chinese companies such as Huawei and Dami.

We will do this through a joint venture between the two of us.”

Zheng Li chose to pass the buck to the authorities: "You have to convince the Chinese government first, and then we can talk about subsequent cooperation."

Gates responded: “You know, this is not an easy thing to do, and if we do it without your consent, it will be a drain on us.

In Chinese terms, this will involve our ‘guanxi’.”

Although Gates left Microsoft's board of directors in 2020, he still maintains a certain influence on Microsoft as a founder and shareholder.

Even if the founder of a company does not have many shares, he can still maintain a certain influence on the company.

This feature was strengthened after Jobs was kicked out of Apple and returned to create the mobile Internet era.

This time, Gates came to China in person to attend the Wuzhen Summit at the invitation of the Microsoft board of directors to lobby Ke Chuang Bio.

Gates, who has been working in the Chinese market for many years, obviously understands China as well as Musk.

Zheng Li replied: "I think we can reach relevant cooperation. We can establish a joint venture."

Although it sounds like Kechuang Bio suffered a loss by licensing the technology to Microsoft.

But in fact, if a joint venture is established, Kechuang Bio will not suffer any loss.

Even China would be willing to do so.

Because Microsoft's industrial VR partners include Lockheed Martin, American is also the world's largest military-industrial company.

If China can obtain the manufacturing data of the enterprise, it will be of great value to China. Of course, how to achieve it specifically, and if it is a joint venture, or a joint venture established with Chinese enterprises, how can the products enter Lockheed Martin, this is a problem.

At the same time, after entering, how to bypass various restrictions and transmit the data back to mainland China is another problem.

After obtaining Zheng Li's promise, Gates ended the conversation and notified the Microsoft board of directors behind him, allowing them to decide whether to launch lobbying.

Zheng Li and Pichai mainly talked about the licensing of industrial VR.

Google is also looking to license industrial VR.

In addition, Google hopes to carry out extensive cooperation with Ke Chuang Future in the field of brain-computer connection VR.

Whether in the PC era or the mobile Internet era, Google can be said to be the big winner.

The search engines and Chrome browsers in the PC era and the Android systems in the mobile Internet era are on par with Tencent in terms of grasping the trends.

However, in the era of the metaverse, Tencent holds shares in Kechuang Future and has taken the lead in launching a virtual universe that is popular all over the world.

Google sees no hope of surpassing the future of science and technology in the field of VR, and no flagship products have yet been produced in the software field.

In the post-mobile Internet era, the presence of search engines is becoming weaker and weaker, and the search engines built into various apps are sufficient to meet user needs.

In China, the number of times Douyin’s own search engine is used throughout the year has already exceeded that of Baidu.

The same is true globally.

In the future metaverse era, people's need for search engines or an integrated search engine will be further weakened.

Therefore, on the eve of the arrival of a new era, Google has been exploring what it should do.

Google has long invested in the fields of autonomous driving and new energy vehicles, trying to enter the track of future driving methods.

However, Amazon and Walmart, the two largest online and offline supermarkets in America, both have their own autonomous driving projects.

Therefore, Google's market share in the field of autonomous driving does not show sufficient advantage, and is even slightly behind.

However, the investment in Google Glass in recent years has yet to see a breakthrough.

After brain-computer VR came out, there were even frequent discussions within Google about whether to cancel the project.

Although the content of the conversation at the Wuzhen Summit dinner was not widely circulated on the Internet, people who were well-informed had already obtained the content.

Pichai is one of them. Since learning that TechCrunch will launch its own AR glasses at the end of the year, he has become even more pessimistic about Google's AR glasses project.

Compared with AR glasses that are directly controlled by the brain, Google Glasses, which require pressing buttons on the edge of the glasses or voice wake-up, are far inferior in terms of technology and experience.

Google has invested a lot in hardware, but the results have been minimal.

Whether it is a Google phone or a Google tablet, it is no exaggeration to say that they have no presence at all.

The Google tablet project was directly cut off, but the Google phone is still struggling to survive.

The same is true for Google Glass, where there is a serious mismatch between price and usage effectiveness.

But in Pichai's view, Google Glass has its advantages.

Whether it is Google Translate or Google 3D Maps, Pichai is confident that Google has absolute advantages in these two areas.

Google has also invested nearly ten years in R&D on AI algorithms for AR glasses.

Another advantage is Google's augmented reality display technology in the field of AR glasses.

This technology is unique to Google and cannot be achieved by China's supply chain manufacturers.

Pichai expressed his hope to work with TechCrunch to create a groundbreaking pair of AR glasses.

Zheng Li responded: "We need to discuss this internally, because in previous communications with Mr. Gates, Microsoft also expressed its desire to cooperate with us in the field of AR glasses.

Compared with Microsoft, your advantages seem to be limited, right? "

When it comes to Microsoft, Pichai's face immediately changed. The two are direct competitors in the AR field. He knows that compared with Microsoft, Google's advantage is not limited, but no advantage at all.

As of 2021, the total value of Microsoft's patents in the AR field is higher than that of Google. The total value of Microsoft's AR-related patents is US$1.68 million, more than three times that of Google.

In 2026, the gap not only did not narrow, but widened.

Pichai explained: “Microsoft’s investments and patents in the AR space are scattered.

Microsoft's investment in AR is concentrated in industrial AR, data processing and other aspects.

Our AR patents are mainly concentrated in Google Glass, which is more in line with the needs of future scientific and technological innovation.”

There is nothing wrong with what Pichai said.

Microsoft's patents in the AR field mainly focus on: input devices that convert data to be processed into a form that can be processed by a computer, and output devices for transmitting data from a processor to an output device.

Image interface devices are Microsoft's largest augmented reality (AR) technology segment, with more than 200 patent applications.

But this kind of patent has no value for the future of science and technology innovation.

Because Ke Chuang Future uses brain-computer connection technology, there is no need to use other interfaces.

You can operate directly with your brain without converting your hands and eyes into computer signals.

Google's AR technology is needed for the future of science and technology innovation, and is mainly concentrated in the field of 3D models or images.

Image quality is crucial for a hardware product in this era.

In the field of AR, Microsoft and Google are one level ahead of Apple.

After Pichai finished his meeting with Zheng Li, he said in an interview with the media:
“Zheng Li is indeed one of the top talents of this era, and he has unique views on many things.

Google will cooperate with Kechuang Future on AR enhanced glasses.

This will be a product that changes the AR ecosystem.”

After the news came out, all the stocks related to the AR field in the A-share market were in turmoil.

You have to know that compared with the booming VR field, AR seems to be half-dead.

“I have long said that AR glasses are what should be developed in the future of science and technology innovation.

Ke Chuang Bio has a super lithium battery, which crushes previous AR glasses in terms of battery life alone.

Furthermore, AR glasses can be controlled through brain-computer connection, which is much more convenient than Google Glass.

When I bought the second generation of Google Glass, I felt like an idiot when I used voice control outside. ”

A digital product enthusiast commented on Weibo.

In fact, Zheng Li only reached an intention with Pichai, and there is still a long way to go before actually signing a cooperation agreement.

But no matter whether the thing is done or not, he will brag about it first. This is also Asan's style.

Post it as soon as you finish writing it



(End of this chapter)