It was reported that Microsoft is one of the few technology companies developing augmented reality headsets in the United States. On March 31, Microsoft announced that it had won an important augmented reality equipment contract from the US Army. This hardware is based on the company’s long-term HoloLens product, and subsequent operations will rely on Microsoft’s own cloud computing services.
A Microsoft spokesperson confirmed to the press that the total contract value this time was 21.88 billion U.S. dollars and the supply contract lasted for ten years. According to reports, in the past two years, Microsoft and the US Army have cooperated to develop prototype products called “Integrated Visual Augmentation System” (IVAS). Microsoft said on Wednesday that the US Army has now entered the product production phase of the project.
Microsoft researcher Alex Kipman said in an official blog post that the enhanced display devices provided by Microsoft can allow U.S. soldiers to gain enhanced awareness of the surrounding situation and promote information sharing and decision-making activities in a variety of scenarios. A Microsoft spokesperson said that this device will be produced in the United States.
It is worth mentioning that before, Microsoft also won an important contract from the US Department of Defense, which is a JEDI cloud computing service contract worth 10 billion U.S. dollars. Microsoft unexpectedly defeated Amazon, a popular candidate, but Amazon was dissatisfied with the final bid result of the Ministry of Defense and has filed a lawsuit.
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Department of Defense officials told U.S. congressmen in February that if disputes over the cloud computing contract bid cannot be resolved in court for a long time, the military may abandon the contract. In addition, in 2018, Microsoft announced that it had won a $480 million contract to develop prototypes of augmented reality devices for the U.S. military.
This cooperation aroused dissatisfaction among Microsoft employees. 94 employees filed a petition asking Microsoft to cancel the contract and stop developing any weapon-related technology. A Microsoft employee who participated in the petition and opposition to the US military supply contract won by Microsoft declined to comment on Wednesday.
A few years ago, Microsoft had developed an augmented reality headset called HoloLens, which was priced at thousands of dollars and sold to some developers at one time. However, this product did not subsequently launch a consumer-oriented, cheaper version, nor was it able to make waves in the market according to Microsoft’s expectations.
However, companies such as Apple and Facebook are still optimistic about consumer-oriented augmented display devices and are currently developing products such as augmented reality glasses. Facebook will sell the first generation of augmented reality glasses this year. According to the latest report this week, Snap, the parent company of mobile chat service Snapchat, is also developing augmented reality glasses, which will be a follow-up upgrade of the company’s current camera glasses series.
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