Fake Holograms, Fake Excitement

Shining a Light on this Sector

Here’s a quiet but interesting new sphere of technology that is expected to receive lots of growth across the next ten years or so. As I write this, the stocks are down a considerable amount…so I wanted to jump in to see if there was an opportunity to check if things were cheap and interesting.

Holograms!

A holographic display is a display that uses coherent light to create a three-dimensional image in space. It has the ability to create the illusion of 3D objects in volumetric space by engaging all four visual functions, binocular disparity, motion parallax, accommodation, and convergence.

https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/holographic-display-market-A12501

It’s application can be used for business meetings, entertainment, engineering, clinical medicine teachings, medical technology, pharmaceutical drug discovery, data storage as well as food, automotive, telecommunications and others.

The global holographic display market size was valued at $1.13 billion in 2020, and is projected to reach $11.65 billion by 2030, registering a CAGR of 29.1% from 2021 to 2030.–Allied Market Research

Surge in demand for holographic displays for medical applications, such as endoscopy and X-ray, is the prime reason that drives the growth of the holographic display industry during the forecast period.

This large estimation derives from demand surges for medical applications such as X-Ray and endoscopy; while the forecast may have been overly generous given the bullish sentiment of the time, it did not consider all the other demand applications. A higher adoption rate of holographic displays for advertising and sporting/entertainment events accelerates the holographic display market but to what extent?

At least in the stock market, investors have pulled back their interest.

On the Other Hand

While this has generated a lot of buzz on the internet, or at Coachella (with Tupac), or the launch of about 100 start up companies with many celebrities involved, the reality is that these technologies are not holograms per se and are incredibly expensive.

One such company, named Proto Hologram made it on all the mainstream sites and shows with celebrities actively posing for marketing. Proto Hologram’s features include: Smart camera, AI-enabled holographic display, High density multitouch, and Proto Cloud. In the other words, they are a very expensive video call.

One researcher in this area states that there are many reasons why holograms aren’t replacing screens (and it wont come true in the next 20-100 years):

1. Cost
   A digital holographic display is still so expensive that normal people cannot afford it. This is because the precision of delicate and expensive materials to produce one is so high.
2. Performance
   Existing digital holographic displays only support very limited viewing angle, image size and frame rate. They cannot meet our visual standard.
3. Applications
   Why do you want a holographic display? Just for being cool? If so, that is certainly not enough to hit the market. It must have some killer applications.
   People are fancying on 3D images, but that is actually not an essential thing.
   As long as 2D images can deliver information you need, there is no strong reason to abandon this cheap and convenient method. Right now we lack the technological sophistication

The development of holographic display has been pretty slow in the past 10 years, especially relative to the previous 10 years.

When will we see holograms for mainstream communication?–Maybe never. Holography is inefficient and unnecessary — augmented/mixed reality will do the job just fine

True Holographic is challenging because it requires many pixels and immense control over many lighting conditions–this comes at a cost which is questionably worth it. At present, high cost of displays and lack of awareness about holographic display still restrain market growth, even if we assume technology innovation to come.

“Holograms” based on 1) a partially reflecting mirror to produce a Pepper’s ghost image or 2) a partially transparent screen on which a flat image is projected are just suitable for static display applications. A Princess Leah hologram with a dynamic sculpture like representation of a human form with sufficiently high resolution would enable wider application of the technology, one yet to be invented.

In other words, at present, our world of videos, 3D files, edits, merging spatial content is not feasible (for authentic holograms). A true hologram cannot be electronically updated, that is, it’s only viable to represent a static image.

Expensive Cameras

So, what are talking about? The advancements are release of “hologram” companies and media crazes are “fake holograms” which essentially are 3D images created with the use of a special technology to display video or recorded content in 3D space. It does offer many opportunities for expensive entertainment budgets, hospitals and schools, but it’s input costs are such that it’s very difficult to see (and why) it will go mainstream.

& for me, all this begs the question (about Proto hologram), if you’re in a box displaying yourself live in a room with your audio and image, why not just be in the room? Besides, how could somebody hide the fact that they’re wearing pyjamas on their morning Teams or Zoom calls to the office?

Option

Given it’s limitation to create dynamic holographies, it may be is to put the holographic display into the Augmented Reality headset to achieve the same visual effect. It makes many things more feasible. Although it adds some more challenges, such as tracking and light sources. In this instance however, it makes sense to allocate money to the Augmented/Virtual Reality technologies that are far more versatile and necessary. Perhaps investing in medical imaging companies could also be another angle.

Closing

Since this is incredible dazzling & still appears like Sci-Fi, market growth is expected to be considerably high. At a time when the travel industry is in dire straits, the use of holograms or rather, new display imaging technology looks to be very appealing. There are many start up/seed-level companies in this space but there are few to really break through to be the leader as many are still unaware or perhaps unconvinced of its use.

On the other hand, just because this is possible, doesn’t mean it will catch on with the general public and business-crowd. After reading more about it, I’m inclined to believe it will amount to more of a Fad than a new way to interact with another. The economy simply isn’t there on a good day. If anything, the new virtual/augmented reality will latch onto the minds of those determined to be enslaved by their new technologies or it will be used selectively in hospitals. Even if it doesn’t, email and video call are the go-to means of communication for everybody on the planet and there is little reason to change this.

Here is a screenshot from SelfEmployed.com who does great reviews

These companies will rise and fall like a little mini empire.

Verdict: It’s not a long-term investment as it doesn’t have an immediate interest to utilize, the costs are too high and it is competing with large corporations for the same communication effect. The 3D displays mocking themselves as holograms will undoubtedly advance in wealthy, niche sectors and for traders, they may want to get involved when it invariably shows exciting growth & a narrative change to give some quick returns. I’d love to see one in person but I am inclined to stay away for my portfolio.

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Always, #StayOnTheBall