Apple building secret team to work on virtual reality: Report

Apple has assembled a large team of experts in virtual and augmented reality and built prototypes of headsets that could one day rival Facebook’s Oculus Rift or Microsoft’s Hololens, the Financial Times reported. A secret research unit, housing hundreds of staff assembled from acquisitions or poached from other companies, is working on next-generation headset technologies, the FT reported, citing people familiar with the initiative. The newspaper had previously reported the hiring of leading virtual reality researcher Doug Bowman by the iPhone maker. Apple was not immediately available to comment. A previous report  had also revealed that Apple has been very quietly putting together blocks of its virtual reality (VR) strategy in 2015. It began with being awarded a patent titled ‘Head-Mounted Display Apparatus for Retaining a Portable Electronic Device with Display’ which essentially means a virtual reality headset powered by an iPhone or iPod – held inside the apparatus. With inputs from Reuters