Canada Photonics AR-VR

The conference according to Malicki-Sanchez Executive Director of VRTO “It is not a conference about VR and AR ; it is a conference about the people who will use and make VR and AR” in an interview from 2019 with Jesse Damiani published in Forbes(1).

The same article is mentioning that “VRTO is the conference where the code of Ethics on Human Augmentation was ratified.”

The Event this year took place in the virtual world due to COVID-19. It is still possible to visit it for several days as of the time of this article till the end of November (https://conference.virtualreality.to/).

Recently, in September, a first report was published by Farmer, T; Matthews, M (August 2020). Spanning the Virtual Frontier: Canada’s Immersive Technology Ecosystem. Information and Communications Technology Council (ICTC). Ottawa, Canada.(3) this report shows that the “Top Use Cases Across Canada’s Vertical Industries” areInteractive Digital Media, Advanced Manufacturing, Health and Biotech, Cleantech and Clean Resources.The authors believe that “Canada’s immersive technology industry spans more than 350 companies across four main hubs of activity-Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, and Alberta. According to Statistics, the immersive industry in Canada was collectively valued at $600 million in 2018, with strong projected global growth potential.”

Of course that not all are Photonics companies but a sizable percentage according to the report, ” those supplying hardware and software tools account for 36%.” So, it is safe to assume that 36%(~127 companies) are Photonics companies. This means that in 2018 photonics companies have contributed a significant portion to the estimated $600 million industry.

(1) Link: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jessedamiani/2019/05/26/vrto-is-still-the-industrys-weirdest-most-relevant-conference-and-2019-is-about-recalibration/

(2) Link: https://virtualreality.to/vrto2020-the-flotilla-final-report/

(3) Link: https://www.ictc-ctic.ca/immersive-technology-ecosystem/