THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:Online shopping has come a long way and has become very popular these days. Yet going by the number of people visiting major stores in the city one gets a feeling that shopping experience is never complete without visiting a real shop. The numbers have only increased especially in some of the clothing stores and in Chalai which is known as a hub for various building materials. A group of technology startups in the city are going to change this notion. They have come up with virtual shopping that can give a closer-to-real experience of physically visiting a store sans the trouble of waiting in the queue. Virtual reality applications are changing how shopping is done here in a big way. Besides startups leading digital companies with offices in the city, such as EY and UST Global are developing VR technology-based products for its customers.
BuildNext
Ever thought of buying building material for homes a major hassle? One would rarely get an idea how the material purchased from the store would actually look when fitted at home. BuildNext, which is one of the most promising startups incubated by Kerala startup Mission, has found a solution to this problem by helping customers to see how the building materials suit their house virtually, before physically buying it.
BuildNext is opening its first store in the city at Jacob’s Junction to help customers choose building materials, by the end of this week. The store consists of a large screen and Virtual Reality headset.
The customer wearing the headset can see himself or herself in a virtual room where they can choose and fit the materials they want, virtually. “One can move around the house and choose tiles, pipes, lights etc of their choice. It is a superstore packed with different building materials,” founder of BuildNext, Gopikrishnan V. People who come along with the customer can see what the customer is doing in the virtual room on a display screen.
The store will have catalogues and samples of building material. A trained executive will help customers to wear the headset, use the control device to choose items and navigate around. It plans to start 40 such stores in different parts of the state by the middle of next year. Started almost two years ago BuildNext gives choices to customers from the wide variety of building materials sourced from different parts of the country.
Tilt Labs
A city-based startup has come up with a cricket simulator - Master Blaster VR- where one can play cricket in the virtual world. The company sees great potential for the virtual games when the real playgrounds are shrinking. Master Blaster VR is different from the regular video game.
“We are trying to bring the cricket stadium and its real feeling in everybody’s living room. It gives a complete work out experience. The only thing missing at present is the feel of the bat’s weight,” said CEO and founder of Tilt Labs, Nikhil Chandran. To get around the shortcoming, the startup is improvising on the game it developed.
The application has features by which the batsman can try a different variety of bowlers, at different speeds. The player can adjust the field position of each fielder and train him to get experience to bypass the fielding.Nikhil, who hails from Kaniyapuram, started the 15-member company 2.6 years ago. The company plans to launch the game by March and will sell it at $15 as the licence fee.
“In addition to the application store, we are also trying to collaborate with different malls and stores. This virtual reality experience will help them to promote their brand and boost the sales of their products using in-app ads that can be placed along the boundary walls as in the real scenario. A high-end version of the game will be developed and provided to cricket training academies, said Nikhil.
A different take
BuildNext is opening its first store in the city at Jacob’s Junction to help customers choose building materials, by the end of this week
Tilt Labs, a city-based startup which has come up with a cricket simulator - Master Blaster VR- plans to launch the game by March and will sell it at $15 as the licence fee. The 15-member startup was started two years ago