PrimeSense is Apple - Computer Point

Israeli company that gave birth to the first Kinect will allow you to push on gesture recognition: the launching pad 3D sensors for smartphones and tablets?

Rome – Apple acquired PrimeSense for a figure of around $ 360 million. With the formality of the agreement, announced by the Israeli financial daily Calcalist, close the open speculation last July at the time of the first contacts between the two sides, but it opens a debate even bigger. What’s cooking in Cupertino to exploit the technologies developed by the Israeli?

PrimeSense has risen to prominence three years ago thanks to the built-in Xbox 360 Kinect, a sensor capable of perceiving and recognizing human body movements that , without the use of additional accessories, allows the player to drive the console. The partnership with Microsoft has given great satisfaction to PrimeSense, which with the same technology used in iRobot AVA and Asus Xtion earned profits in excess of $ 200 million. Despite the success, the two companies have decided to separate, Microsoft decided to produce at home the second edition of gestural controllers and the Israelis concentrated on the development of 3D sensors.

The idea would be to integrate in small mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, as demonstrated with the Nexus 10 last developer conference Google. Among the projects developed in the last year, also, there is such Capri 1.25 designed for the processing of three-dimensional images on displays of varying size. So do not just phones and tablets, but also a TV: maybe a new Apple TV?

There is talk of assumptions, of course, because no one can know what the real plans of Apple, as usual, not exactly talkative about the objectives of the acquisition. “Apple is usual to acquire small hi-tech company, but do not talk about our plans,” said spokeswoman Kristin Huguet. Same old story on the other side, with representatives from PrimeSense which confirmed the sale and the impossibility of being able to add details on the future organization.

The certainty is that the secret rooms of Cupertino teeming with ideas and the demonstration is the campaign purchases in 2013: Passif Semiconductor, HopStop, WifiSLAM, Locationary, Embark now and PrimeSense. Small business function in the intentions of Apple, beat interested in new ways and at the same time enriching the potential of its evergreen. Among these is undoubtedly the desire to broaden the Gesture Recognition Technology to facilitate a remote control that goes beyond even the touchscreen. Likely that the list of new arrivals stretch yet, for that matter, between cash and investments for the great acquisitions, we are yet to spend 146.8 billion dollars.

Alessio Caprodossi