SAN FRANCISCO—San Francisco, of course, boasts an unequalled concentration of technology giants and thousands of start-ups. It’s where Apple, Google and Facebook had their beginnings. And although other cities such as Austin and Seattle are taking their place as tech hubs, San Francisco continues to serve as a top magnet for many of the most innovative companies and executives who make the Bay Area their corporate home or make frequent visits as they forge local collaborations.
Among these visitors is UK-based V-Nova, led by CEO Guido Meardi, a company redefining compute-aware data formats, compression, and immersive experiences. Under the V-Nova banner, Meardi has earned wide tech industry recognition for his advancements in data, video, imaging, and point-cloud compression with patented technologies that have been granted international standard status by MPEG, ISO and SMPTE. But its V-Nova’s work in XR headset content technology based on the company’s compression advancements that has been capturing the attention of tech companies in San Francisco, as well as entertainment studios in Hollywood – and the Chinese tech giant vivo.
Vivo is among the major global tech players recognizing V-Nova and its virtual reality format V-Nova PresenZ as a game changing content format destined to forever change the global virtual reality headset industry. To showcase its own eagerly anticipated vivo Vision MR Headset, vivo turned to V-Nova for the unprecedented immersive power of V-Nova PresenZ and made it a pivotal part of the vivo Vision MR Headset official launch recently held in China as well as its current retail introduction across Asia.
Seeking to expand the existing market of 30 million VR headsets from gameplay to feature-length movies, V-Nova PresenZ delivers a multi-dimensional experience that puts the viewer right in the center of all the action. Besides boasting a breakthrough technology that allows audiences to feel physically present in the story, V-Nova PresenZ achieves this unprecedented freedom of multi-dimensional movement within each scene without fatigue or discomfort.
Demonstrating the immersive power of the V-Nova PresenZ volumetric 6DoF format, V-Nova debuted the company’s first in-house produced original action movie and environmental adventure Sharkarma: Guardian of the Oceans. Produced by V-Nova Studios in collaboration with WildAid and Wendy Benchley, the noted ocean advocate and wife of Jaws author Peter Benchley, Sharkarma follows the story of a group of adventurers on an ocean-sailing journey that spirals into peril when the crew’s reckless disrespect for ocean life unleashes dire consequences.
“We’re honored that Vivo selected Sharkarma to introduce audiences across Asia to what immersive cinema truly feels like,” said Gianluca Meardi, General Manager of V-Nova Studios. “Unlike traditional 3DoF experiences that restrict your movement and often cause discomfort, our 6DoF volumetric format lets viewers step inside the story and experience it naturally. I want to personally thank Chloe Chen Jiaxin, Head of the Vivo Vision Partner Ecosystem, and her leadership team for immediately recognizing the power of immersive cinematic content. As headsets evolve into high-end devices, this collaboration highlights how immersive films can attract not just gamers, but any passionate movie lover seeking new ways to experience stories.”
“This partnership with vivo marks an exciting step for immersive media. With V-Nova PresenZ on vivo Vision, audiences can experience stories in a way that feels natural and cinematic, opening the door to a new era of XR entertainment.” said Meardi.
The newly launched vivo Vision MR combines dual 8K Micro-OLED displays for stunning clarity with an ultra-light 398g design for all-day comfort. Powered by the Snapdragon XR2+ Gen 2, it delivers ultra-low latency and intelligent spatial computing, while advanced eye-tracking and micro-gesture controls create an intuitive, truly immersive experience – perfectly complementing the V-Nova PresenZ 6DoF cinematic format.
“Collaborations like ours with Vivo prove that immersive cinema is not just the future — it’s happening now,” added Gianluca Meardi. “Together, we’re opening the door to an entirely new way for audiences to live stories, not just watch them. It’s the first format that allows creators to deliver immersive experiences without any compromise — no dizziness, no distortion, just pure storytelling. And because our format is perfectly integrated into traditional movie pipelines, it enables a profitable hybrid approach where producers can create once and distribute across both traditional 2D/theatrical/TV and immersive channels with minimal additional adaptation costs.”
Content producers and headset manufacturers engaged in VR/XR have long struggled to combine longform content and headsets without leaving users dizzy or nauseous, until now. The V-Nova PresenZ format is already being embraced by Hollywood studios who envision the technology’s potential to push the boundaries of what’s possible in extended reality and shape the next generation of visual storytelling. “With the V-Nova PresenZ format support on the vivo Vision MR, audiences can now enjoy a volumetric movie format that enables free movement in six degrees of freedom over extended durations. As a result, V-Nova PresenZ represents a significant advancement for cinematic storytelling, enabling viewers to feel inside the movie rather than simply watching it on a screen,” added Meardi.
Consumers can now access and download Sharkarma along with several other examples of V-Nova PresenZ content via the V-Nova Studios’ app, ImmersiX (https://v-nova.com/immersix/), now available on the Steam platform.
From London to Los Angeles to Beijing, V-Nova Studios is helping the world’s biggest movie producers and tech players to imagine what it truly means to step inside a story.
