Alibaba has led an $18 million funding round in to WayRay, a company based in Switzerland which is an augmented reality car navigation startup, just one day after Intel purchased Mobileye, a driverless car technology.
Vitaly Ponomarev the company founder and CEO said in a statement “At the moment, WayRay is the world’s only developer that integrates augmented reality systems into cars, it gives us an advantage over traditional HUDs and provides the opportunity to collaborate with the largest global car brands.”
WayRay has also announced that it has partnered with Banma Technologies which is a startup funded by Alibaba and SAIC Motor, the largest automaker in China, to develop a new car navigation and infotainment system, resulting in WayRay’s Navion, an augmented reality heads up display for drivers that will be built in to one of SAIC’s 2018 models making it “the world’s first vehicle in production with a holographic AR head-up display,” according to the company.
“Augmented reality is the future of car navigation because it improves safety. Drivers don’t have to look down at gauges; they simply look through data in their windshields while driving and watching road conditions” states Alex Shi, CEO of Banma Technologies.