Operators include China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom, Deutsche Telekom, EE, KDDI, KT, LG Uplus, NTT DOCOMO, Orange, SK Telecom, SoftBank, Telefonica, Verizon and Vodafone. They all share plans to try and market XR viewers, with the aim of providing more immersive and unprecedented 5G experiences. Extended reality (XR) devices are lightweight glasses and connect to smartphones equipped with Qualcomm mobile platforms, such as the Snapdragon 855 or 865 chipsets, and connect via USB Type-C cable. Among the main advantages of this technology are high bandwidth and low latency, which is essential for extended reality. These apps provide more immersive augmented reality experiences, which can impact from leisure or entertainment to business meetings as well. The expectation is that this set of technologies “will transform the way the world connects, communicates or consumes content”, according to Qualcomm’s own words. Qualcomm uses the Qualcomm® XR Optimized Certification Program to test performance and validate compatibility between XR devices and smartphones, thus ensuring a perfect user experience. Two certifications are offered, one for the mobile phone and one for the XR device, so that manufacturers can check optimization between multiple phones without requiring each to do their job individually, which improves the experience. Companies like iQIYI, Nreal, OPPO, Panasonic, Pico and Shadow Creator are in the process of being certified to be able to quickly deploy with Snapdragon-compatible devices in the coming months.
