It has been reported from a number of technology news sources that Project Fortaleza is on hold.
Although the rumors have been flying about a pair of augmented reality glasses that were expected to be released at some point in the not-too-distant future, by Microsoft, reports are suddenly being released that suggest that the wait is going to be considerably longer than expected because the project, as a whole, has been put on hold.
Expectations for AR wearable technology have been high since a Microsoft patent was leaked last year.
The augmented reality device had been in the works as a peripheral for Xbox One. The codename for this product was called “Project Fortaleza”. That said, since that first leak, there hasn’t been a great deal of information that has come available from the company. Moreover, Microsoft, itself, has never confirmed or denied that the wearable technology exists, at all. Now, it looks as though the Project Fortaleza work has been “temporarily cancelled”. The original report was made on WPDang, a Chinese website.
This suggests that the augmented reality project is simply on hold and not actually stopped altogether.
According to the source, the reason that the AR glasses are being placed on the back burner has nothing to do with the actually implementing the technology. The development of the device didn’t seem to be coming with any hitches, at all. However, a considerable number of the tech patents that are involved in the process of making this device do not actually belong to Microsoft. Therefore, the company would be required to license those patents – an action that is now keeping Fortaleza from becoming available to Xbox One owners.
Some of the patents have already been licensed for the Kinect sensor’s second generation, but those licenses are specifically meant for that one device and cannot be carried over to be used for anything else.
Until those issues are sorted out, it is clear that the primary push being made by Microsoft will not be in augmented reality. This could end up presenting the company with some challenges as it looks as though Sony and its Oculus are hoping to be the next breakthrough in VR gaming.
As the company battles to survive and rebuild its relevance, transactions are the new strategy.
As BlackBerry desperately attempts to remain afloat and recreate itself into a position of relevance in the technology world, this Canadian handset maker is now placing a considerable focus on mobile payments as a new major element of its overall strategy.
While the market is currently clearly dominated by Android and iOS devices, BlackBerry isn’t giving up.
The company has now announced its intentions to become considerably more aggressive in the highly competitive and rapidly moving mobile payments environment. It has also confirmed a new three year agreement in which it has now entered with EnStream LP, which is a smartphone transactions joint venture that is owned by Bell, Rogers, and TELUS, the largest wireless carriers in Canada.
The agreement is to provide a secure mobile payments transaction services platform for Canadian banks and consumers.
This agreement will give EnStream the ability to leverage the infrastructure at BlackBerry in order to be able to give a range of mobile operators and financial institutions the capability to provision sensitive credit and debit card data into any NFC technology enabled smartphone.
BlackBerry released a statement that said that “Today the mobile payments space is primed for growth.” It used data that had been produced by Gartner in order to back this up, showing that it has been predicted that the total value of the transactions that will be completed through the use of smartphone technology will rise from where it had been in 2012, at $35 billion, to reach $173 billion by the close of 2017. That represents a tremendous 31 percent compound annual growth rate.
This forecast also includes the purchase of tickets and merchandise, as well as of bill payments. That said, it does not include airtime top-ups or funds that are sent from person to person.
BlackBerry’s statement went on to further explain its position that “Supporting mobile payments reinforces BlackBerry’s ability to provide unique services that help enterprise customers deploy secure mobile solutions that help promote productivity among their workforce and drive new revenue streams.”
