Microsoft received $22 billion from the United States Army for an Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS) that would provide AR combat goggles to soldiers based on HoloLens 2 technology. However, Congress has recently rejected the Army’s request for an extra $400 million for 6,900 of these devices due to unsatisfactory testing results citing issues such as eyestrain and nausea. Nevertheless, lawmakers have added $40 million towards developing a newer version 1.2 model with improvements like better reliability, reduced power demand and more comfort while still allowing training with their first batch of 5,000 goggles allotted in the original contract. Therefore Microsoft’s massive venture into military defense contracts is set back by this recent news but hope may still remain if they can properly refine their current product into something suitable for use in actual combat scenarios.
Read more about this here: https://www.roadtovr.com/congress-halts-microsoft-defense-augmented-reality/
