Almost a year after it was launched in China, the HTC Vive Focus VR Headset is being released worldwide to 37 markets with a new focus on business interests touting itself as an “all-in-one solution for enterprise”. It will launch on November 11 for $999AUD.
It’s part of a larger attempt to make HTC VR headsets appealing to companies, including a newly announced collaboration app called Vive Sync, which lets employees in different offices meet and work together in VR.
Although VR headsets have recently been marketed towards gaming, HTC has recognised that VR has is very relevant to businesses in particular automotive design, medical training, situational training, and location-based enterprises.
The set is priced at $999, with the option of upgrading to the Vive Enterprise Advantage service package which will provide commercial licensing, dedicated support for VIVE Enterprise products, and more.
HTC’s Vive Focus does not require a phone or an external PC. It is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor, offers a resolution of 1440 x 1600 per eye and the battery lasts up to three hours.
However, it uses HTC’s Vive’s proprietary Android-based platform Vive Wave rather than Google Daydream. Vive Wave is now used by many third-party manufacturers, mainly in China.
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HTC has also announced a new collab tool dubbed Vive Sync, which enables VR conference calls allowing users to brand the VR environment and import virtual objects to share with others in the enterprise application.
This feature can also be integrated with Office 365. Trials for this are set to being in December ahead of the Q1 launch next year.