Audi Showcase Virtual Reality Features at CES 2019

One of the first car brands to make use of this burgeoning technology is Audi, who have showcased an innovative VR entertainment system at the 2019 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) currently taking place in Las Vegas.

Billed as redefining in-car entertainment, back seat passengers in the Audi e-tron will be able to experience movies, video games and interactive content using virtual reality glasses. The technology adapts virtual content to the movements of a vehicle in real time, meaning that if the car drives through a right turn, the spaceship in the experience, for example, does the same.

Through a subsidiary, Audi Electronics Venture GmbH, Audi has co-founded a start-up company, holoride GmbH, which will commercialise this new form of entertainment via an open platform that will be made available to all carmakers and content developers in the future.

Audi is demonstrating the immersive futuristic technology with “Marvel’s Avengers: Rocket’s Rescue Run,” an in-car VR experience for back seat passengers being brought to life by Disney Games and Interactive Experiences.

Wearing VR glasses, the passenger in an Audi e-tron is transported into a fantastical depiction of outer space: The Audi e-tron now functions as the ship manned by the Guardians of the Galaxy, as the passenger makes their way through an asteroid field together with Rocket, a character that will appear in Marvel Studios’ Avengers: Endgame in spring 2019.

“Creative minds will use our platform to come up with fascinating worlds that turn the journey from A to B into a real adventure,” said Nils Wollny, Head of Digital Business at Audi.

“We can only develop this new entertainment segment by adopting a cooperative, open approach for vehicle, device and content producers.”

Audi was founded by August Horch in Germany in 1910.