Magic Leap's patent applications have skyrocketed, but its products remain a mystery?

For technology companies, patent applications seem to indicate a certain direction of development. In the past seven years, Microsoft has applied for the most AR patents, far exceeding other companies developing AR products, such as Samsung, Sony, Google and Magic Leap. But in 2015, Magic Leap's patent applications increased significantly, while other companies saw a significant decline, which seemed to echo Magic Leap's popularity.

Overall, the number of AR patents filed by technology companies has increased significantly, which means that we may see iterative updates of AR products in the next few years. For example, Microsoft is a prominent case. They have started selling the $3,000 HoloLens this year.

How many patents have they applied for in the past seven years?

The patent application data in the above figure comes from Envision IP, which is mainly engaged in patent analysis and approval (because patent applications need to wait 18 months after the company submits the application before being made public, the data in 2015 is not complete).

Microsoft applied for more than 600 AR patents between 2009 and 2015, but in 2012, it applied for 164 patents. Samsung was second, applying for 374 patents in the same period, while Sony applied for slightly less. Meanwhile, Google applied for 230, Magic Leap 177, and Apple 166. Another US startup Osterhout Design Group was also active in AR patent applications, applying for 122 patents in 2013, ranking fourth at the time.

Meanwhile, Magic Leap's patent applications increased significantly last year. It is clear from the chart that compared with other companies, the company filed very few patent applications from 2009 to 2014, and filed 164 applications in 2015 alone. Although we still see some amazing video demonstrations, it cannot stop investors from paying attention to them. Maulin Shah, general attorney at Envision IP, said, "Perhaps they have been optimizing their technology and IP strategy before filing a large number of patent applications."

However, Facebook has only applied for 37 AR patents in the past seven years.

Is Magic Leap really just video?

In addition to the eye-catching patent applications, Magic Leap has also released important news in terms of financing. In February this year, Magic Leap received $793.5 million in Series C financing with Alibaba as a participant. In August, a new team was quietly established in Austin, Texas, but it is still a mystery what it will do. Not long ago, the company received investment from Yinjiang Co., Ltd.

Looking back, every major news about Magic Leap seems to be inseparable from videos. In March 2015, the company released a video about its product. Although the video did not show the specific form of the product, it explained the functions it could achieve. In the office, users can see virtual images, operate shooting games, send and receive emails, and perform some gesture operations.

In October, a video of a giant whale suddenly appearing in a gymnasium went viral on WeChat Moments. The video scene looked like a school gymnasium, with a giant whale dragging seawater rising from the ground and then falling, and the gymnasium seemed to have turned into the ocean. But later, some media reported that this and the indoor shooting game mentioned above were special effects.

The latest video, "A New Morning", was released in April this year. A small note was added to the video stating that "there are no video effects or editing methods except text." In this video, we can see smartphone notifications appearing above the table. You can click on message notifications and emails at will, view data reports, open shopping websites to shop, or fill the room with jellyfish. This video is a real-time rendering of Pingu.

Obviously, Magic Leap, which has no products but only amazing videos, always gives people a new understanding of AR and keeps the outside world speculating about its technology. Even so, they are still applying for more patents. The company's founder Rony Abovitz only revealed that the virtual elements are projected from the light source on the edge of the device and reflected into the user's eyes using the diffractive nano-ridges.

Immersion has previously published an article that believes that Magic Leap's killer feature is Cinematic Reality (movie-level reality) produced by projecting the entire digital light field directly to the retina with optical fiber, which can automatically focus the human eye. And they claim that they can produce a soft and hard kit with Cinematic Reality effects. When the human eye adjusts the focus, the angle and depth of the light field will change accordingly, and the effect is comparable to that of a light field camera .

The biggest difference between Magic Leap and HoloLens lies in the display part. The latter uses a semi-transparent glass to project reality from the side DLP. Virtual objects are always real, similar to the Google Glass solution.

Patents may not be enough to explain everything

Of course, the application for new patents is only one way to determine the company's internal development direction and cannot fully explain their specific development plans.

From another perspective, this patent application data shows how long it takes for a company to come up with an invention concept and release a product. Take Microsoft for example, from 2010 to 2100, their AR patent applications increased from 68 to 110. In 2015, Microsoft finally announced the holographic headset Hololens that it had secretly developed. Users can see holographic images projected in the real environment after wearing the headset.

HoloLens is undoubtedly the most advanced consumer product, with a new type of lens called a "diffractive element" that uses built-in fiber components to reflect images back to the user's eyes. As a result, all augmented reality glasses like HoloLens will use diffractive element lenses, or lenses that are very similar.

In contrast, Magic Leap has not yet announced any physical products.

It is undeniable that patent applications do predict the development of various companies, such as Sony and Google, which may be involved in the field of augmented reality. Google applied for an AR patent in 2011, and three years ago, they released Google Glass and sold it to the public. Sony has actually been researching augmented reality in the past, and recently released a prototype device after a series of patent applications. One of Samsung's patent applications is a contact lens that can transform the real world into a 3D canvas.

For Magic Leap, the patents and funds are basically in place, and perhaps the mystery of the product will soon be solved.

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