In the future, conversation partners will be visible through 3D glasses.
Hamburg Europe’s major mobile network operators want to offer their customers so-called hologram telephone calls. Deutsche Telekom, the British Vodafone, Telefónica (O2) from Spain and the French group Orange announced on Wednesday that they are working with the start-up Matsuko, which has programmed the appropriate software. The network operators are concerned with the development of a common platform for the transmission of three-dimensional real-time images, it said.
It remained unclear to what extent the project goes beyond a mere declaration of intent. Investment sums were mentioned just as little as a concrete schedule. According to a Telekom spokeswoman, the project is still “at an early stage”.
In practice, the so-called “holography” is intended to resemble the communication of the characters in the science fiction series Star Trek. The passengers of the spaceship Enterprise were able to converse with three-dimensional images of their interlocutors early on.
The Matsuko solution, however, is a bit more cumbersome: the person called sees the three-dimensional upper body of the caller through virtual reality glasses (VR glasses), who is looking into the selfie camera of his smartphone. The 3D hologram can be created using the camera data. However, the caller cannot see a hologram of the called party wearing the VR glasses. The holography only works in one direction.
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The project should make it possible “to see a person virtually as a hologram with amazing realism,” promises Matsuko boss Matus Kirchmayer. So far, his solution has been compatible with Apple’s iPhone and iPad, as well as the VR glasses HoloLens 2 and NReal.
5G should make hologram phone calls easier
The plan is to transmit the hologram data across networks via the new platform in the future. Limiting 3D calls only to your own infrastructure does not make sense for customers, according to Telekom. It remained unclear whether customers of non-partners such as the German 1&1, which is currently building its own network, are still left out.
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The telecommunications industry has been working on hologram connections for a long time, which are technically possible but very complex. The new, ultra-fast 5G mobile communications standard now makes it much easier to implement thanks to the high data rates it enables.
As early as 2018, Vodafone demonstrated a hologram video call in a moving minibus in Aldenhoven. However, the project at that time was based on a different technology than the current project and was only moderately convincing visually. With the closing of ranks that has now taken place in the industry, the technology is to be taken to a new level and made into an everyday product in the future. According to estimates, the platform could be available for end customers in about two years.
The big US tech companies like Google or Meta are working on their own VR telephony solutions that should work independently of the big network operators.
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