ARtillry Intelligence’s Chief Analyst Mike Boland was recently a guest on Michael McNair’s Empower: Be Different podcast. See the episode takeaways below, along with embedded audio. Subscribe to Empower on Apple Podcasts or Anchor.


What are the biggest trends in XR today? What’s the revenue outlook? And what’s driving it all? These are a few things discussed on a recent episode of Michael McNair’s Empower podcast. They also name favorite Silicon Valley episodes, market corrections and work habits.

In short, there are several notable trends in XR today. We have mobile AR platforms lowering barriers for app development, yet challenges in platform fragmentation. The AR cloud will unlock capability for developers, while adjacent industries like self-driving cars spin off technology to XR.

They talk about the economics of consumer VR, the question of whether or not “VR is dead” (spoiler alert: no), and when XR will reach the 100 million magic number for unit penetration. Meanwhile enterprise XR could accelerate things, as workplace adoption happens sooner.

Listen to the full episode, embedded at the bottom, or jump around to different parts using the chapter markers we’ve coded in the links below. Enjoy.

Chapter links

Silicon Valley history repeats…Are we in another correction?
AR platforms democratize development, but fragment the user base.
Are Pokemon Go and Snapchat lenses “AR”? Spoiler: it doesn’t matter.
How will self-driving cars create a bigger market for XR?
How are tech giants accelerating XR, and what are their motivations?
Why is the AR cloud so important?
Is VR Dead? Spoiler: no
The economics of consumer VR
Will AR and VR ever reach smartphone-like ubiquity?
How will the enterprise drive XR markets?
Don’t be a ‘solution in search of a problem.’
Emerging tech like XR has to pass the ‘grandmother test’
Magic Leap’s marketing dilemma
Recommended meetups and industry publications
Giveaways and free stuff!


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Disclosure: ARtillry has no financial stake in the companies mentioned in this post, nor received payment for its production. Disclosure and ethics policy can be seen here.