Chi Xu (Nreal) on the Conception, Competitors, and Clear Potential of the Nreal Light
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The Guest
Chi Xu is the founder and CEO of Nreal, a company devoted to making consumer-facing mixed reality wearables available to all.
After earning a PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Chi spent time at both Nvidia and Magic Leap before leaving to join another startup. From there, he conceived and founded Nreal.
Since its founding in 2017, Nreal has been aggressively iterating on their hardware and software, and received a lot of press and awards, including “Best Start-up” at CES and “Best in Show” at the Augmented World Expo (AWE).
The Conversation
In this conversation, Chi talks about the origins of the company and how his team is outpacing the competition. We talk about Nreal’s approach to making the glasses a complement to the smartphone and the path from wearable displays to fully featured AR smartglasses.
He shares his perspectives on alternative approaches to the market and the high barrier for any product to achieve.
We go on to talk about the copycat products we saw at this year’s CES as well as the lawsuit that Magic Leap has thrown his way.
Links From The Episode
- Article: Nreal Light AR glasses add Clay AIR hand tracking, hint at 5G gaming by Jeremy Horowitz at VentureBeat
- Article: Spatial, Nreal, and 5G carriers team up for holographic collaborative AR by Jeremy Horowitz at VentureBeat
- Video: Nreal Light Mixed Reality Glasses: Unboxing Video by Sam Ochanji at Virtual Reality Times
- Book: High Output Management by Andrew S. Grove
- Episode Transcript