With over 75 million downloads in less than three weeks, the release of Pokémon Go was one for the books. All over the world stories in the news told of hunts for the likes of Squirtle, Charmander and Co.
Time and again there were reports on how augmented reality finally had its first big breakthrough. But amid all of the fanfare, one important detail seemed to go unnoticed for the most part: the technology behind Pokémon Go isn’t new at all. The term ‘augmented reality’ has been used by the computing and entertainment industry since the beginning of the nineties. What Pokémon Go managed to achieve, however, was to bring this technology to private users by making it available for anyone with a smartphone or tablet.
Augmented reality presents enormous marketing potential, a fact that’s supported by the interesting wave of new e-commerce applications that have come about over the past few years: from virtual furniture stores, to fitting glasses via webcam, new approaches to this technology appear to cropping up more in more in our daily lives. And as this trend continues to grow, the industry will most likely react by releasing more and more applications. Companies that are quick to react will be able to make the most of users’ interest for augmented reality and potentially be able to tap into new customer groups.