Samsung partners with Qualcomm, Google to build extended reality ecosystem

Samsung Electronics Co has announced that it has partnered with Qualcomm and Google to build an ecosystem for extended reality (XR).

The South Korean tech giant announced the partnership at the Galaxy Unpacked event in San Francisco on Wednesday, where it unveiled its new flagship smartphones series 'Galaxy S23' and latest PC lineup 'Galaxy Book3', reports Yonhap News Agency.

"We will transform the future of the mobile industry by building the XR ecosystem together with Qualcomm and Google," TM Roh, president of Samsung Electronics' Mobile eXperience business, said at the event.

XR is an umbrella term covering virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR).

"It will take time to introduce new products, but we will make progress and provide you with new updates," Roh said, adding that creating a new ecosystem cannot be done by Samsung alone and requires collaboration with strong partners.

Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon and Senior Vice President of Android Hiroshi Lockheimer at Google appeared on stage alongside Roh to announce the news.

Amon said Samsung and Qualcomm have been working together to open a new world for XR experiences based on more than 25 years of partnership.

Lockheimer also emphasized the importance of collaboration with the two tech firms with state-of-the-art hardware and software technologies to bring to the world next-generation digital experiences.

The announcement did not include any specific products under development or a timeline for them, but industry experts speculate Samsung might develop XR headsets built on Qualcomm's chipset and Google's operating system.

It also came amid speculation that Samsung's rival Apple could launch its first VR headset as early as this spring.

--IANS

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