Meet & Greet in AR, with Spatials Jacob Loewenstein

Published: Aug. 26, 2019, 10 a.m.

Last episode was all about the value of VR in creating virtual\nmeeting spaces; today, we\u2019re looking at AR. As Jacob Loewenstein from\nSpatial explains, both have their advantages in an enterprise\nsetting, but AR is best suited for people collaborating together in\nthe same room. Listen to this edition of XR for Business to find out\nwhy.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAlan: Today\u2019s guest is Jacob Lowenstein, VP of Business Development and Strategy at Spatial. Spatial\u2019s mission is to empower people to be more connected, creative, and productive. Organizations are increasingly distributed across offices and information doesn\u2019t flow easily; success depends on people working together. Their first product enables people to collaborate anywhere with AR. The founders have deep backgrounds in 3D user interfaces. Co-founder Anand Agarawala sold his previous startup, BumpTop \u2014 a 3D physics multi-touch desktop \u2014 to Google, and also demoed this in a TED Talk. Co-founder Jinha Lee developed pioneering AR interfaces at MIT, Microsoft, and Samsung and then also showed them at a TED talk. They are a passionate team of 3D designers, VR and AR experts based in New York and San Francisco. Our guest today, Jacob, has also been a partner at Samsung NEXT. And I\u2019m really, really excited, because Spatial has raised a seed round from such amazing investors as Inovia Capital, Expa, Lerer Hippeau, Leaders Fund, and Samsung NEXT. To learn more about Spatial, you can visit spatial.is. \n\n\n\nJacob, welcome to the show.\n\n\n\nJacob: Hey, it\u2019s great to be\nhere. Thanks so much for having me.\n\n\n\nAlan: It\u2019s my absolute pleasure.\nWe had an awesome opportunity to meet at Charlie Fink\u2019s exclusive\ndinner at CES this year, and I was really blown away by the warmth\nand passion that you bring. And so I want to just thank you for\ntaking the time to jump on the show with me.\n\n\n\nJacob: I had a blast at that\ndinner, and I believe we both had delicious Indian food together.\nShout out to Charlie for organizing that. I met a ton of wonderful\npeople, and the compliment goes right back in the other direction. I\nmean, you have been at this for a while as such a positive and\nfundamental figure, helping shed attention and light on the projects\nin the space that matter and that are moving the needle. And frankly,\nyou\u2019ve been moving the needle yourself, and have been a builder in\nthis space for some time. And so I\u2019m excited to chat with you, and\nhappy to answer any and all questions.\n\n\n\nAlan: Well, on that note \u2014 and\nI thank you for that \u2014 tell me about Spatial. I know about it, but\nfor the people listening \u2014 really, you guys have built enormously\npowerful tools. So, maybe give us the idea of what Spatial is, and\nhow it\u2019s being used.\n\n\n\nJacob: Totally. So, I\u2019m going to\ngive you the headline, and I think the backstory is a little bit\nilluminating. I know you spoke a bit about that already, but I\u2019m\ngoing to dive deeper. But the headline is that Spatial enables people\nto collaborate from anywhere with augmented reality. And the idea is,\nessentially, we\u2019re all big believers in the VR and AR space. I\nimagine folks that listen to this podcast are, or are trying to learn\nto be. And if you\u2019ve done a lot of demos in VR/AR, you\u2019ve probably\nencountered the same phenomenon, which is; you get someone to put on\nthe headset and they say, \u201cOh wow, this is cool,\u201d and they\nsmile and they compliment you, and you probably never hear from them\nagain. And it&