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Roh Tae-moon, head of MX business at Samsung Electronics, takes part in the Galaxy Unpack 2023 event in San Francisco where he unveils the Samsung Galaxy S23 series. (courtesy of Samsung)

Samsung Electronics has announced it’s collaborating with Qualcomm and Google to create an extended reality (XR) ecosystem with high growth potential.

With Apple already expected to release its first XR headset this year, Samsung Electronics, Qualcomm, and Google seem to have joined forces to form a collective to compete with Apple. Fierce competition between these different players is expected in the XR ecosystem.

Roh Tae-moon, president of Samsung Electronics’ mobile experience (MX) business, shared the news at a press conference on Wednesday (local time) after the Galaxy S23 Unpacked event in San Francisco.

“Qualcomm, a chipset powerhouse, product leader Samsung Electronics Mobile, and Google, which is good at operating systems (OS), have declared their start to create an extended reality ecosystem,” Roh said.

“We will once again bring change to the future of mobile by creating a next-generation extended reality experience with Qualcomm and Google,” Roh said at the Galaxy S23 Unpacked event held earlier that day.

Extended reality refers to virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed reality (MR), and is mainly experienced through headsets.

According to predictions by Counterpoint, a market research firm, the XR headset market will grow rapidly to 105 million units by 2025.

It is predicted that by 2030, XR headsets will amount to 1 billion units, which is equivalent to the smartphone market (1.2 billion units).

Meanwhile, at the CES 2023 tech event held in Las Vegas earlier this year, Google, Meta, and Sharp also presented technologies and devices related to augmented reality. This shows that these players, too, are considering this as a market with high potential for future growth.

Regarding Roh’s remarks, the industry is calling Samsung Electronics’ plans to join hands with Google and Qualcomm to dive into the XR market “noteworthy” at a time when the smartphone market is shrinking.

There are also predictions that Samsung Electronics could unveil a new headset in the second half of this year. Although the company launched “Gear VR” in 2015 and introduced new versions or other models every year until 2019, these products have been discontinued ever since.

Regarding Samsung’s first XR product, Roh told the Washington Post that “we’re getting there, but we’re not too far away,” without revealing any specifics.

“We believe that the ecosystem has to be somewhat ready for the product to be launched and for the product to be successful as well,” Roh said. “And as you know, there have been many attempts by other companies so far, but not as successful as had been hoped because perhaps the ecosystem was not as ready as it should have been,” he explained.

The XR ecosystem seems to be ripe now, however, with the announcement of this three-way agreement.

Concerning the connection of XR with smartphones, Roh said, “Of course there are devices for that as well, [. . .] but perhaps they can be joined with the smartphone and develop further from there.”

Meanwhile, Apple is expected to release its first XR headset in the first half of this year at the earliest. In fact, Bloomberg recently reported that Apple could unveil the new headset as early as this spring and begin shipping in the fall.

As such, sooner or later, Samsung Electronics and Apple are expected to compete in the XR device market beyond just the smartphone market.

Samsung Electronics is also aiming to sell 10% more Galaxy S23s than its previous model.

“The initial response from customers such as global mobile carriers, large distributors, and retailers is very good. The Galaxy S23 Ultra will take the lead by accounting for more than 50% of our total sales,” Roh said.

By Lee Jeong-hun, staff reporter

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