
PrimeSense bought by Apple for $345M - AviSchneider
http://www.geektime.com/2013/11/17/a-sensible-exit-primesense-bought-by-apple-for-345m/
======
beambot
This is likely a soft landing. Microsoft is actively developing their own
time-of-flight depth camera in-house rather than using Primesense's "projected
computed stereo" solution. Primesense probably saw the writing on the wall...

I like disassembling depth cameras and laser rangefinders. We used the sensors
extensively in robotics, back when the only ToF option was the $10k Swiss
Ranger SR4000. You can find some of my writings on my robotics website:

[http://www.hizook.com/blog/2010/03/28/low-cost-depth-
cameras...](http://www.hizook.com/blog/2010/03/28/low-cost-depth-cameras-aka-
ranging-cameras-or-rgb-d-cameras-emerge-2010)

[http://www.hizook.com/blog/2010/06/20/low-cost-depth-
camera-...](http://www.hizook.com/blog/2010/06/20/low-cost-depth-camera-
update-microsoft-kinect-november-others-follow-shortly)

[http://www.hizook.com/blog/2009/01/04/velodyne-
hdl-64e-laser...](http://www.hizook.com/blog/2009/01/04/velodyne-
hdl-64e-laser-rangefinder-lidar-pseudo-disassembled)

~~~
mctx
Can you recommend a low cost depth camera for robotics?

~~~
beambot
If you're indoors, any of the Primesense devices are best (Kinect or Asus
Xtion). If you're outdoors, you can't really rely on the Kinect -- the
projected IR light patterns get drowned out by the sun. Then you have to go a
time-of-flight solution: the Swiss Ranger SR4000 (expensive!) or the PMD
Technologies sensor (I've heard they're available for a couple $hundred now).
Kinect2 is supposed to be time-of-flight when it is released too.

------
derwiki
A small note to the HN moderators: the previously submitted title of this
article mentioned Kinect by name, and I clicked through. If I had seen just
the new title, "PrimeSense bought by Apple for $345M", I would have no idea
what it was and moved on. I'm sure the new title is more succinct/accurate,
but the old title was more helpful.

~~~
tzury
+1 especially given the fact the OP here is the Author as well.

------
mkl
This might be the last chance to get a developer unit [1]. Depends what Apple
intends to do with the technology, I guess, but they usually seem to keep
technologies for themselves. FingerWorks stopped selling immediately when
Apple acquired them [2].

[1] [http://www.primesense.com/developers/get-your-
sensor/](http://www.primesense.com/developers/get-your-sensor/)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fingerworks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fingerworks)

------
nitrogen
There goes the industry. PrimeSense was, to my knowledge, the only company
selling affordable room-range 3D sensors to independent developers.

There are countless unexplored avenues for 3D sensing technology, far beyond
gimmicky gestural controls. My own application, as a high-accuracy presence
detector for home automation, reached the front page of HN a few years ago
([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2303395](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2303395)).
Others were using these sensors for DIY robotics applications, telemedicine,
etc.

Now we'll probably have to wait another 20 years for another round of patents
to expire before we "little guys" get another shot at depth sensing.

Good luck to PrimeSense, they probably deserve the exit, but bad news for the
rest of us.

~~~
dimatura
You're being too pessimistic. Depth sensing is not that complicated. Even
vanilla stereo vision has gotten really good in the last few years and will
only get better.

~~~
onedev
Can you explain to me how Depth Sensing works at a high level?

~~~
nitrogen
Some useful starting points:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time-of-
flight_camera](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time-of-flight_camera)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structured-
light_3D_scanner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structured-light_3D_scanner)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Range_imaging](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Range_imaging)

------
beloch
This purchase certainly makes one wonder what Apple is up to. Kinnect has
been, for the most part, a party-game interface, and that's not really in
Apple's bailiwick. Capri is not really small enough or appropriate for phones,
since you tend to gesture _with_ your phone rather than _at_ it. It is small
enough that it could be included in laptops and tablets though. There are
obvious gimmicks Apple is likely to go for, like gesturing at your laptop to
make it unlock or summoning Siri with a dance move. It might also be a decent
couch-interface for Apple TV, if Apple hasn't completely given up on that yet.

Here's hoping Apple has something interesting under wraps to put Primesense to
work on and isn't just filling up their patent war-chest.

~~~
vidarh
> you tend to gesture with your phone rather than at it

Samsung at least have been _trying_ to change that:
[http://www.samsung.com/us/support/howtoguide/N0000003/10141/...](http://www.samsung.com/us/support/howtoguide/N0000003/10141/120552)

Not that I've ever seen anyone do it.

~~~
eonil
Samsung never been succeeded anything else than copying something.

~~~
Alterlife
If you copy something, and the copy is _better_ than the original in some way,
is the copy still a copy?

When do you get to call it innovation?

~~~
eonil
Did you buy the Galaxy Camera? That was the real first product that they can
say something _original_. Unfortunately, nobody supported them. How about
Galaxy Watch? It was the second, and also nobody helped.

Have you checked out Bada SDK? Have you used KIES manager?

Or, what's your point? Are you telling me that they really have something
_better_? So they're not a copy?

In which way? Do you mean the _Android_ which comes from Google? Because
Android is just an assembly? Are you talking about
[AMOLED]([http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=z8I5oMxbO9Q&desktop_uri=%2Fwatc...](http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=z8I5oMxbO9Q&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3Dz8I5oMxbO9Q)).
Or are you talking about TouchWiz widgets? Which looks so similar to iOS, even
Google warned them to stop copying. Or Wacom tablet in Galaxy Note series? I
know some people want it for Wacom tablet. Is it also Samsung's innovation
just like Android which is also a Samsung's innovation?

It's irony that the word "Android" is actually a legally registered exclusive
trademark owned by Samsung in Korea. Any other companies can't sell a phone
named "Android" in Korea. So maybe you're right. That's very innovative
strategy. But personally, I don't think _real innovators_ won't do such crap.

Please tell me only one thing they really made _better_ rather than copying
other one. Not just larger and more. Because you won't call adding one more
wheel to a Toyota truck as an innovation.

I am not talking they're not trying. They sometimes try, and any trial for
original product horribly fails. Isn't it true?

They really suck at original or innovation. But for copying? Oh they're
supernatural. They're doing it over decades, and even has been supported from
government for that.

It's simply because _you can 't derive originality or innovation by copying
others._ If you ever have tried to make something new, or better, you should
know that you must break existing one first. Copied but better? That's
impossible doesn't make sense at all.

~~~
gaadd33
I didn't know that Google let Samsung register Android as a trademark in South
Korea, that's pretty strange.

~~~
eonil
There's a story. Here're details.

An unknown Korean company registered the word "안드로이드" which is the Korean
representation of "Android" as exclusive trademark in Korea, and Samsung
negotiated with them and bought (or leased) fully exclusive right for the
trademark from them. So other companies can't use the Korean word in their
product in Korean market.

Google also registered trademark of the Korean representation for that but
only in limited fields, (computing hardware/software), so there was no problem
to register the trademark for any another fields (mobile phones, advertising,
games communications, internet service, radio, TV …).

------
rayiner
I'm really surprised Microsoft hasn't bought the company yet already. Kinect
is the key differentiator for the Xbox versus the Playstation, and it can't be
a positive thing for Microsoft's supply chain for a key manufacturer to be
bought up by Apple.

~~~
jasonwocky
Microsoft doesn't use PrimeSense for the XBox one. It's all in-house now.
Should have negligible effect on the supply chain.

~~~
Osmium
Presumably Microsoft has a perpetual license to PrimeSense's IP? Or does
someone else entirely own that?

~~~
hershel
They bought another company in the field(3dv systems), which used a totally
different physical principles(instead of dual cameras, using time of flight of
photons) in their tech.

~~~
throwawaykf
Canesta. I looked into their stuff before the Kinect came out. I am no expert
in the field, but I thought their time-of-flight sensor is really clever.
Basically, the speed of light is too fast to get an accurate ToF measurement
within living-room distances using timers. So they use a technique where the
intensity of the reflected IR is directly proportional to the ToF. Since you
can measure intensity with much more accuracy and precision (and ease) than
the time taken for light to travel a few meters, you get a pretty accurate 3D
point cloud of the space being sensed. I can't find their white paper that
explains this, but it's a good read.

~~~
bane
That's interesting...was it an effect based on attenuation of the light? i.e.
reflected photons from close objects will attenuate less than ones further
away therefore intensity will be higher?

~~~
throwawaykf
Something along those lines, but they also did something clever with the
timing of emitting IR flashes and correlating the received number of photons
with those flashes. I really wish I could recall more clearly, but I looked
into it around 2007 - 2008. I tried finding the white paper, but all the links
are dead :-( I might have a copy lying around, though... I'll try to dig that
up.

~~~
bane
Don't sweat it, I just think that if that's the method, it's a really cool
hack.

~~~
throwawaykf
Eureka! Found it on scribd:

[http://www.scribd.com/doc/40735369/Can-
Esta-101](http://www.scribd.com/doc/40735369/Can-Esta-101)

~~~
Osmium
Thanks for the link :) Do you happen to know how to download the pdf off
scribd? It looks like you need to _pay_ scribd to do it (or to read past the
first few pages), which doesn't quite seem fair since I'm assuming they don't
have a license to the content themselves, in which case it'd be someone else's
copyrighted content they're profiting off...

~~~
icegreentea
Can't get it off scribd, but thanks to the magic of archive.org (seriously!
amazing stuff), the entire pre-purchase canesta website is still up. Just look
prior to mid 2010 or so. Here's the exact pdf in question:

[https://web.archive.org/web/20091122234143/http://www.canest...](https://web.archive.org/web/20091122234143/http://www.canesta.com/assets/pdf/technicalpapers/Canesta101.pdf)

------
filipedeschamps
IMHO, gesture navigation suck. It's much more expensive for your body to move
your arm+hands around compared to one single click of a finger.

If you are playing a game, it's fine, you want to move around depending on the
game style. But once you're looking for relaxing activities, like flipping
over channels, is stressful.

~~~
ceejayoz
> It's much more expensive for your body to move your arm+hands around
> compared to one single click of a finger.

It's less expensive than hunting around for the remote in the couch cushions
for five minutes.

------
Osmium
Regarding the headline, "A sensible exit: PrimeSense bought by Apple for
$345M", does anyone have any opinion on the price here? It seems reasonable,
but really just serves to highlight just how _absurd_ the Snapchat offer was
earlier this week (in my opinion).

~~~
pbreit
If you still have a problem with snapchat you don't understand human behavior,
startup dynamics, advertising and large audiences.

~~~
Osmium
This is entirely true. I don't understand Snapchat's valuation in the
slightest, which is why I mentioned it here in comparison to this acquisition.
I'm yet to see how large audiences and advertising revenue are an answer to
anything; see MySpace and Zynga, both of which fulfill(ed) those criteria.
Snapchat seems like an easy service to clone in theory relative to, say, a
YouTube or a Twitter-certainly Facebook could do it-so what are they bringing
to the table exactly? Where does their value come from? A bit off topic here
anyway. I just thought it was a nice comparison.

~~~
KaoruAoiShiho
MySpace and Zynga are tiny compared to SnapChat.

------
modeless
This is disappointing (or encouraging, if you're an Apple competitor).
Primesense is inferior technology. Kinect 1 (Primesense) uses structured light
scanning, while Kinect 2 (not Primesense) uses far superior "time of flight"
measurement.

~~~
pbreit
And Leap Motion is way better than both.

~~~
phmagic
Depends on the use case. Leap is not very versatile.

------
phmagic
Looks like Microsoft got the better deal here with a better camera and lower
acquisition price.

[http://venturebeat.com/2009/02/21/sources-confirm-
microsoft-...](http://venturebeat.com/2009/02/21/sources-confirm-microsoft-is-
buying-3dv-systems/)

------
NLPsajeeth
If Apple did indeed acquire Primesense, there certainly is good possibility
that they will keep the hardware and software for themselves and stop
licensing it out to other companies.

I wonder if this spells doom for the following products: ASUS Xtion
[http://event.asus.com/wavi/product/xtion.aspx](http://event.asus.com/wavi/product/xtion.aspx)

Structure Sensor [http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/occipital/structure-
sens...](http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/occipital/structure-sensor-
capture-the-world-in-3d)

------
brianbreslin
This is probably bad news for leap motion who was surely hoping apple would
acquire them. Maybe google will acquire leap?

~~~
pbreit
Appple rarely pays full price and the non-apple opportunity is far larger. I'd
say Leap remains in an even better position.

------
mattivc
Didn't they already try to sell their tech to Apple before they went to MS,
but got turned down?

------
boatracers
I've worked for a number of years on the motion processing sensor side. The
Apple acquisition makes sense, as it helps to add another input device for
what I suspect will be an Apple TV. For the most part, everyone has hands and
arms. To enable your hands to control what's showing on the screen seems in
theory to be quite practical.

On the flip side, playing games is one thing.... controlling your TV is a
different story altogether. I'm not sure how great an experience it will be.
Samsung already has gesture controls on some of their camera-equipped TVS. The
experience of waving your hands around for control can actually get a bit
tiring.

It will be interesting to find out how Apple plans to integrate this
technology into their devices.

------
tzury
Here are some facts:

    
    
        $85M investments so far.
        3 years ago, the company refuses $400M offer from Microsoft (rumour) - saying: 
            "we are here for the long run".
        It Powering XBox Kinect, Dumped at XBox One.
        

Don't ask me for citations, as this is a Israeli company, and the sources are
mainly Hebrew tech-news sites.

Also amongst "Most Innovative Companies (2011)" [1]

[1]
[http://www2.technologyreview.com/tr50/2011/](http://www2.technologyreview.com/tr50/2011/)

------
josephpmay
I don't think this has anything to do with Apple TV or gestures on tablets.
IMO, those are gimmicky applications of the technology that look cool but
aren't practical on a daily basis. My guess is that Apple is making an
augmented reality play, hedging that Google Glass will be successful and
they'll have to compete with them. Infrared motion tracking has a lot greater
potential to be successful in augmented reality versus the single camera setup
Glass uses.

------
kateho
This makes a lot of sense especially if Apple wants to move Apple TV on. Lots
of TV manufacturers like Samsung has gesture navigation implemented already.

This should be exciting.

~~~
yanivf
For all intended purposes, this one is defintly meant for the AppleTV (or
iTV). PrimeSense's tech is still years away from being able to put inside a
smartphone (allthough tablets are another option which is more possible in the
medium-term future).

------
jdrobins2000
This is a huge win for Apple! I expect to eventually see this in product
categories they don't even offer yet, like smart home products. Not to mention
the obvious, that they could add gesture support to the AppleTV.

------
lightblade
I speculate this is a reaction to Google's recent acquisition of Flutter.

