Virtual Reality Hardware Market Q4 2014

Another quarterly update, another set of new companies developing hardware for the consumer VR market – welcome to our Q4 2014 update.

Let’s start with the ‘Face Race’ – i.e. companies developing HMD’s for virtual reality. Our device spectrum visualisation is shown below.

So what’s going to happen this quarter? The major HMD launch is expected to the Samsung Gear VR which is slated for a December 2014 release. Samsung has been really smart with respect to launch preparation because they’ve been working with a slew of  developers to port existing Oculus Rift games over to the Gear VR, as well as initiating a range of brand-new games. HMDs are pretty useless without content so they’ll be numerous titles available for the Gear VR at launch.

Other HMD’s of note include the Carl Zeiss VR One which is also expected to launch this year, as well as the VRTX One that’s already available, if you’ve got a LG phone of course.

Broadly speaking, HMD’s fall into one of two categories – wired or wireless. The visual below, an extract from the KZero Hardware Radar chart shows HMD companies split by these two categories as well as their development stage.

The peripheral market (i.e. VR controllers) is expected to grow in line with the HMD marketplace from 2015 onwards. Why? Because the ability to interact inside a VR environment adds greatly to the overall experience. At present, existing games and apps that allow movement/player control rely on console controllers but there’s a slew of companies developing more ‘intimate’ and precise ways to engage. These are shown in the visual below.

The full report covering the hardware VR marketplace can be ordered here.

Further information: