In NetEase's second-quarter earnings report released on June 30, 2016, NetEase CEO Ding Lei revealed a lot of NetEase's ideas and progress in VR layout, such as already investing in VR live startup NextVR, such as NetEase's AR games. "Do not wait until next year" can be launched and so on.
Already invested in NextVR
NetEase attaches great importance to the development of VR/AR. The company invested in the US NextVR last quarter. This company specializes in live broadcasting companies. At the same time, in terms of AR, NetEase has also been very careful and has tried to consider applying AR to the best conditions in different games. At the same time, it also noted the popularity of Pokémon GO in the West, but also seeing whether such innovative models can continue.
Ding Lei said that in short, NetEase will not lag behind in VR/AR, because in the past five years, the company’s mobile-end games have been ahead of the market because the company has been fully prepared from 2009 onwards. During the time of exploration and innovation, we have today’s achievements. In the field of VR/AR, NetEase started earlier than any opponent and invested the most money.
In addition, he also mentioned, "We are also the only partner of Google VR platform Daydream in China, so the company has very close and even strategic cooperation with the world's best VR hardware companies, platform companies and content companies." I do not know if this is a word to find, because Huawei, Asustek and other companies have also said that the first batch of DayDream partners.
Will VR games be launched during the year?
Ding Lei shows that the company has developed VR/AR games and is testing it, but VR will be slightly later, not that we haven't developed it, but because there are still very few VR devices on the market, we hope (hardware market) can again Mature, we will release products again. The same is true of AR, but it may be slightly faster. As for how fast it is, Ding said, "I don't think I have to wait until next year."
Live and education will join VR elements
NetEase has three live broadcast platforms, one is Netease CC live related to games and eSports, including live games such as Fantasy Westward Journey and Hearthstone legends, etc. The second is NetEase BoBo, live show started two and a half years ago, including singing, talent Performance. NetEase is a pioneer in this field and has started to broadcast it four years ago.
At the same time, after the Spring Festival, Netease has joined news broadcasts among news clients. This is Netease's three live broadcast platforms, which are currently profitable. The financial reports are not listed separately, but the company attaches great importance to it.
Ding believes that NetEase's innovation in live broadcast business will mainly involve adding VR live content. This is why the company invests in NextVR. Ding thinks that the next generation of live broadcast should be immersive multidimensional VR live broadcast. At the same time, it is very optimistic about education. Netease Open Classes and Netease Cloud Classroom have very impressive achievements in China. The company is developing an Internet-based classroom based on VR technology to give everyone an immersive classroom experience.