Baahubali-2 stepping stone for extending VR market: AMD VP

AMD Senior Vice President and Chief Architect Raja Koduri has said Baahubali part-2 is a stepping stone for extending the Virtual Reality (VR) market beyond films and entertainment.
"The impact of virtual reality will extend way beyond films and entertainment.. It will have a profound impact on other markets like education, medicine, travel and all of those things.. Baahubali actually sets a stepping stone for all of these markets," Koduri told ET Now in an interview.
He was replying to a question whether VR technology was commercially viable and if there was any appetite for it among Indian filmmakers.
Koduri, who is the cousin of the film's director, Rajamouli, said India is a huge market and there are many amazing untold mythological stories which need to be told using VR technology.

To another query on affordability of VR technology, Koduri said AMD has been very successful in not only bringing VR to the market, but also making it very affordable.
Many companies including Imax have been making efforts in this regard and also in China, where many virtual reality arcades have been set up, he added.

"More than an year ago a VR computer used to cost almost USD 2000 and now with efforts of AMD, we have computers that cost as little as USD 500," he said.
On the collaboration between AMD and Arka Media, Koduri said his company has tied up with Arka Media to bring the VR experience to people outside theatres, by setting up kiosks at malls and cafes across India.

"When Rajamouli saw the VR experience, he was inspired and so we had a match made in heaven where as a technology company we wanted a piece of content (Baahubali 2) created by Rajamouli that would push our technology in the market... That is how the whole collaboration came together," he added.