Stuttgart/Frankfurt. Porsche, start-up Holoride and media company Discovery presented a new VR solution for use in vehicles as part of the Next Visions Day at the International Motor Show (IAA) in Frankfurt. The cooperation partners presented edutainment to demonstrate how we might be using media in our vehicles in the future. Passengers can choose from various two- or three-dimensional experiences ranging from documentaries and an underwater adventure through to a journey in time. The newly presented VR experience transports users in a drone moving through a futuristic city. 

The aim of the collaboration between Porsche and Holoride is to give vehicle passengers the opportunity of immersing themselves in virtual worlds: development plans include entertainment, edutainment, as well as solutions for productivity and relaxation in the vehicle. For this purpose, Holoride software links a VR headset with sensors and the vehicle so that content can be adapted to the car’s driving movements in real time. For instance, if the car is being driven around a corner, the vehicle that the passenger is virtually travelling in will also change direction. Consequently, users experience maximum immersion into a fictitious world to significantly reduce the symptoms of travel sickness. This also applies to watching 2D content. 

In future, the system will also, for example, be able to evaluate navigation data in order to adapt the length of a VR experience to the calculated duration of the journey. Holoride software makes it possible to offer elastic content: a new form of media especially designed for use in vehicles, in which the available content adapts to driving time, motion and context. Having Discovery as a partner for two-dimensional content means benefiting from their expertise in the area of real-life entertainment, as the company supplies topically matching documentary material for the in-car VR experience. 

Holoride experience to be launched on the market in series production in 2021 

Holoride is pursuing an open platform approach. Automotive manufacturers and content producers can use the technology. “Now that we have teamed up with Discovery, we can demonstrate for the first time how users can also experience 2D content such as films in the virtual 3D world. We call this an ambi-environment,” explains Nils Wollny, CEO of Holoride. Wollny founded the entertainment tech start-up together with Marcus Kühne and Daniel Profendiner in Munich at the end of 2018. As part of the Startup Autobahn innovation platform, the young company had shown that the Holoride software works seamlessly with manufacturer vehicle data for motion-synchronised, real-time generation of virtual reality (VR) and cross-reality (XR) content. The cooperation with Discovery underlines Holoride’s approach to also bring edutainment content to the vehicle in addition to gaming and entertainment. Holoride aims to bring this new form of entertainment using commercially available VR headsets for passengers in the rear seats of production cars to market by 2021. 

“Our joint projects with Holoride and Porsche Digital have demonstrated what the technology is capable of. In future we also envisage Porsche-specific solutions, for instance for the race track,” says Anja Mertens, Project Manager for Smart Mobility at Porsche AG. 

“The cooperation with Porsche and Holoride emphasises our pioneering role within the motion picture environment. We are delighted to also be able to show our high-quality documentaries to vehicle passengers in the future,” says Alberto Horta, Deputy General Manager at Discovery Deutschland.