Latest news with #IntegratedVisualAugmentationSystem
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Buy 4 Low-Beta Stocks VTSI, FNV, ESLT & PM Amid Geopolitical Chaos
The U.S. stock market is likely to be volatile due to escalating tensions between Israel and Iran, which have spiked oil prices and raised fears of broader regional conflict. Additionally, uncertainty around the Fed's interest rate decision amid rising geopolitical risks adds to market pressure. In this context, creating a curated portfolio of low-beta stocks is a prudent strategy. This provides a safeguard against the uncertain market, equipping investors to navigate volatility with greater resilience and foresight. Hence, stocks like VirTraInc. VTSI, Franco-Nevada Corporation FNV, Elbit Systems Ltd ESLT and Philip Morris International Inc. PM are worth betting on. Beta measures the volatility or risk of a particular asset compared to the market. In other words, beta measures the extent of a security's price movement relative to the market. In this article, we are considering the S&P 500 as the market. If a stock has a beta of 1, then the price of the stock will move with the market. So, the stock is more volatile than the market if its beta is more than 1. In the same way, the stock is not as volatile as the market if its beta is less than 1. For example, if the market offers a return of 20%, a stock with a beta of 3 will return 60%, which is overwhelming. Similarly, when the market slips 20%, the stock will sink 60%, which is devastating. We have taken a beta between 0 and 0.6 as our prime criterion for screening stocks that are less volatile than the market. However, this should not be the only factor to be considered while selecting a winning strategy. We need to take into account other parameters that can add value to the portfolio. Percentage Change in Price in the Last 4 Weeks Greater Than Zero: This ensures that the stocks saw positive price movement over the last month. Average 20-Day Volume Greater Than 50,000: A substantial trading volume ensures that the stocks are easily tradable. Price Greater Than or Equal to $5: They must all be trading at a minimum of $5 or higher. Zacks Rank Equal to 1: Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) stocks indicate that they will significantly outperform the broader U.S. equity market over the next one to three months. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank stocks here. Here are four of the 16 stocks that qualified for the screening: VirTra Through a project called IVAS (Integrated Visual Augmentation System) run by the U.S. Army, VirTra is finding more opportunities to grow its business. This is because the project has employed cutting-edge technology to give more specialized training to soldiers. Also, the U.S. Department of Defense's updated approach to technology procurement is expected to give VirTra a stronger advantage in securing more military contracts. Franco-Nevada By the end of last month, Franco-Nevada made a major new investment by purchasing a royalty on the Côté Gold Mine in Ontario for $1.05 billion. Since the mine has significant gold resources with huge revenue potential, Franco-Nevada is well-positioned to gain once the agreement closes, likely by the end of the second quarter of 2025. Elbit Systems Elbit Systems is a well-known global defense player. ESLT's backlog is at a massive $23.1 billion, of which 66% is from outside Israel. This suggests a strong demand from across the world. Philip Morris From a traditional cigarette company, Philip Morris is gradually transforming into a smoke-free player, as represented by IQOS heated tobacco and ZYN nicotine pouches, which are gradually becoming the company's major focus area. Philip Morris is also strongly focused on rewarding shareholders and cost-cutting initiatives. You can get the rest of the stocks on this list by signing up now for your two-week free trial to the Research Wizard and start using this screen in your own trading. Further, you can also create your own strategies and test them first before taking the investment plunge. The Research Wizard is a great place to begin. It's easy to use. Everything is in plain language. And it's very intuitive. Start your Research Wizard trial today. And the next time you read an economic report, open up the Research Wizard, plug your finds in, and see what gems come out. Click here to sign up for a free trial to the Research Wizard today. Disclosure: Officers, directors and/or employees of Zacks Investment Research may own or have sold short securities and/or hold long and/or short positions in options that are mentioned in this material. An affiliated investment advisory firm may own or have sold short securities and/or hold long and/or short positions in options that are mentioned in this material. Disclosure: Performance information for Zacks' portfolios and strategies are available at: . Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Philip Morris International Inc. (PM) : Free Stock Analysis Report Elbit Systems Ltd. (ESLT) : Free Stock Analysis Report Franco-Nevada Corporation (FNV) : Free Stock Analysis Report VirTra, Inc. (VTSI) : Free Stock Analysis Report This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research ( Zacks Investment Research Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
CNBC
10-06-2025
- Business
- CNBC
1. Anduril
Founders: Brian Schimpf (CEO), Palmer Luckey, Trae Stephens, Matt Grimm, Joe ChenLaunched: 2017Headquarters: Costa Mesa, CaliforniaFunding: $6.3 billionValuation: $30.5 billionKey Technologies: Artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles, edge computing, explainable AI, generative AI, machine learning, robotics, software-defined securityIndustry: DefensePrevious appearances on Disruptor 50 list: 3 (No. 2 in 2024) Over the last year, Anduril has struck a series of deals that demonstrate the company's growth from a disruptive defense industry startup to one of the leaders in a critical sector. In April 2024, Anduril was one of two companies selected by the U.S. Air Force to build and test drone prototypes for the service's Collaborative Combat Aircraft program, the first in a new generation of uncrewed fighter aircraft, and a contract in which it beat out traditional defense stalwarts Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman. And as defense moves into the AI era, Anduril has also been working more closely with the tech sector to create the military of the future. In December, Anduril partnered with fellow Disruptor 50 company OpenAI on deployment of an advanced AI system for U.S. counter-unmanned aircraft systems to be used in "national security missions." In February, Anduril took over Microsoft's multibillion-dollar Integrated Visual Augmentation System wearables program with the U.S. Army, a contract that was valued at nearly $22 billion. Then in May, Anduril teamed up with Meta to develop the VR and AR headsets for use by the U.S. Army as part of that program. "Anduril has a lot of traction," founder Palmer Luckey said in a CNBC interview in February. That traction has led to a rapid rise in the company's valuation. Last August, Anduril closed a Series F round, valuing the company at $14 billion and securing $1.5 billion in funding to build a more than five-million-square-foot factory, in addition to other investments in production across multiple states and in Australia. An announcement last week of a $2.5 billion Series G more than doubled that valuation to $30.5 billion, making it one of the most highly valued private tech companies in the U.S. It's hard to separate any one accomplishment from the rest for Anduril, but perhaps it's the company's push into the military headsets that signals the next era of disruption for the company but also takes things back full circle for Luckey, who sold his headset startup Oculus VR to Facebook for $2 billion in 2014, and was unceremoniously fired just a few years later. "Anduril builds a lot of different systems across a lot of different domains — so air, land, sea, subsea, space, cyberspace, and eventually subterranean," Luckey said in the February CNBC interview. "[Integrated visual augmentation systems] and systems like it are going to be the portal through which the warfighter commands and controls all of these different autonomous weapons and autonomous sensors." Luckey has spoken at length about his vision of putting such a tool in the hands of soldiers, in a vein that maybe still seems science fiction film and writing, but which he says will create a world that grants "not just the ability to see the thermal, visual and near IR spectrum, but the ability to see into a digital model of the past, present and future, and just seamlessly team with large packs of autonomous weapons." Of Anduril's deal with Meta, Luckey said, "Of all the areas where dual-use technology can make a difference for America, this is the one I am most excited about. My mission has long been to turn warfighters into technomancers, and the products we are building with Meta do just that." With technology, warfare and defense becoming more intertwined, and at a time of increased focus on efficient government budgets that Anduril's product-based model is based on, the company is clearly now one of the major players in a sector it set out to disrupt only a few years ago, and is perhaps even starting to chart a path well beyond the battlefield. "I'm a believer that we're going to mediate our view of the world with technology," Palmer told CNBC.
Forbes
03-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Revolutionizing Eye Tracking With Event-Based Sensing
HoloLens 2, a AR headset designed by Microsoft, exhibited during the Mobile World Congress, on ... More February 28, 2019 in Barcelona, Spain. (Photo by Joan Cros/NurPhoto via Getty Images) The Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS) was a $22B project awarded to Microsoft in 2018 to develop Augmented Reality (AR) headsets for the US Army. As part of the funding, Microsoft was on contract to deliver 120,000 units of its HoloLens equipped headsets, but discontinued its production in 2024. In early 2025, Anduril Industries, a defense-tech startup, announced it would takeover the program. Anduril specializes in AI driven hardware technologies with a mission of 'Transforming US & allied military capabilities with advanced technology'. Palmer Luckey is CEO of Anduril. Funded by a suite of notable venture capital investors, it boasts a range of defense products spanning terrestrial, air, underwater and outer space defense capabilities. Palmer Luckey developed Oculus, a leading AR/VR platform, and sold it to Facebook (now Meta) in 2014. He left Meta in 2017 and started Anduril. Meta has evolved the Oculus platform into the Meta Quest headset family. Equipped with inward facing sensors, it enables eye tracking features which have various advantages. Meta is active in research on eye-tracking using event-based cameras from Prophesee. Use of event based cameras (versus conventional frame based cameras) provide significant benefits in speed, sampling rate, accuracy, background and noise rejection. It also dramatically reduces size, weight and heat generation, critical features for user comfort and battery life as commercial and military deployments of these headsets accelerate. Going full circle, Anduril and Meta recently announced a collaboration to work together to build to extended reality (XR) devices for the U.S. military. This effort will leverage the IVAS program that Anduril assumed charge of in early 2025. Mark Zuckerberg and Palmer Luckey finally see eye to eye! Prophesee, a pioneer and market leader of event-based neuromorphic vision technology recently announced a collaboration with Tobii, the global leader in eye tracking and attention computing. The goal is to deliver a next-generation event-based eye tracking solution tailored for AR/VR and smart eyewear applications. Given the discussion above on the fusion of IVAS, Meta and Anduril capabilities for AR/VR headsets, this is an exciting development. Event based sensing asynchronously reads out only the pixels which record intensity changes above a user defined threshold, resulting in lower latency, power, compute, storage and thermal management requirements. Prophesee ('predicting and seeing where the action is'), based in France, uses its event-based cameras for industrial automation, AR/VR, security, healthcare and AoT™ (Autonomy of Things) applications. Founded in 2014, the company closed its C round funding of $50M in October 2022. To date, it has raised $127M. Prophesee's focus is on providing its sensor chips, SDK (Software Development Kit) and camera reference designs to end users like Tobii and others who develop imaging systems for various applications. It's next generation MetaVision GenX 320 QVGA sensor (320 x 320 pixels, 6 μm pixel pitch, 4 mm x 3 mm footprint) is designed for eye tracking in gaming and wearable AR/VR headsets. Figure 1 highlights some of the capabilities: Figure 1: Metavision GenX 320 QVGA Sensor Capabilities Luca Verra is the CEO of Prophesee. A key initiative underway is the development of an even leaner event sensing chip than the MetaVision QVGA for smart glass applications. Reducing the pixel pitch by 50% (< 3 um) realizes a 5X reduction in the chip area. While the MetaVision sensor consumes ~25 mW of power at a system level (includes the sensing readout, signal pre-processing and a 900 um wavelength LED), the dedicated chip for smart glasses aims to reduce power consumption by > 10X, and provide data speeds approaching 1 KHz (similar to that reported in the Meta paper above). Compared to this, a CMOS based framed camera solution consumes ~250 mW (not compatible with smart glass applications) and data speeds of ~120 Hz. Data speeds are important in eye tracking since it provides finer resolution, important for various psychological aspects like emotional state, intent and interest. Mr. Verra is excited about the collaboration with Tobii: "Event-based vision is a perfect match for the growing demand for low-power, always-on sensing in next-generation wearable devices. This partnership builds on a strong foundation of collaboration between our teams and expands our joint capabilities into the eye-tracking space. With Tobii's proven leadership in eye tracking, combined with our experience in event-based sensing, we aim to set a new standard for what's possible in AR/VR and smart eyewear.' Tobii, founded ~ 20 years ago, is headquartered in Sweden, and bills itself as a leader in eye tracking (delivered the world's first remote eye tracker). It serves thousands of enterprises, universities, and research institutes around the world, and is a pioneer in attention computing (Figure 2) which it defines as 'technology that understands human attention and intent'. Listed on the Swedish NASDAQ, it has 600 employees and annual revenues of ~$90M. Figure 2: Factors Going Into Attention Computing Using Eyeball Tracking Tobii uses machine learning, artificial intelligence, and advanced signal processing to decode head and eye movements, translate microscopic gestures into accurate gaze signals, and generate insights to reveal what captures a person's attention and interpret intent. Applications fall into four broad verticals: 1) Consumer research and user experience: transitions the market research process from a formal survey-based one (in which questions posed to respondents invariably create bias) to a emotional one in which subtle cues gained from eye tracking like gaze, pose and presence can provide valuable information to modify products and packaging. The data can be gathered in formal or informal settings (like when customers shop and are looking at alternate products). 2) Developmental psychology and healthcare research: Eye tracking data offers valuable insights into human behavior and cognitive processes, making it a versatile technology across a wide range of research domains like psychology, medical diagnostics and education. 3) Consumer technologies in gaming and wearables: System-on-chip solutions for eye tracking provide seamless interactions between users and their devices in wearables, smart glasses and AR/VR headsets. Sony is one of Tobii's customers (Sony PlayStation product lines). 4) Automotive, driver monitoring systems (DMS): Tobii Autosense enables OEMs to build for tomorrow, pushing the boundaries of what's possible, and achieve true in-cabin differentiation and safety monitoring. Tobii's hardware comprises a suite of wearable eye trackers. Software integration and ensuring that the devices work robustly across all populations (age, skin color, eye color, illumination conditions, vibrations, facial and eye-makeup, etc.) are critical challenges. To date, the company has sold a few million units. According to CEO Anand Srivasta, the eye tracking solutions market is in its infancy. He expects this number to grow as the adoption of this technology accelerates, especially in the consumer wearables, industrial productivity and DMS markets. Event based sensing can deliver significant disruptions in certain verticals where low size, weight, power consumption and heat generation are critical (wearables) and high data rates can enhance the eye tracking resolution to provide more insights into consumer intent and emotion. Other applications may continue to use framed CMOS cameras (when full images are needed, like in DMS). He expects the collaboration with Prophesee to 'complement to our existing camera technologies, giving our customers even more options and flexibility when designing their products. Smart eyewear is one of the most demanding segments for eye tracking—requiring ultra-low power, high performance, and seamless integration into a standard glasses form factor." As technology accelerates, data generation volume increases exponentially. In many cases, most of this data is useless, non-eventful and non-actionable. Attempting to analyze all of it slows down decision making and insights, and risks missing events that are important. Event based sensing has a significant role to play in lowering compute, storage and thermal management costs, providing higher actionable data rates and opening up new markets and technological acceptance.
CNBC
30-05-2025
- Business
- CNBC
Meta makes a big move into defense. Here's how it could start to matter for investors
Meta's expensive bet on virtual and augmented reality technology is making its way to the Pentagon. Investors who have been worried about when all that spending will pay off should feel a little bit better now. Meta announced Thursday that it is partnering with defense-technology company Anduril to create VR and AR devices such as headsets for the U.S. Army — and the news piqued our interest for a few reasons. For starters, the privately held Anduril was started by none other than Palmer Luckey, the founder of Oculus, which Meta acquired in 2014 for $2 billion to kickstart its ambitions in the world of VR technology. Luckey had an acrimonious split with the company then known as Facebook in 2017, but now they're back on working terms. But, as investors, the main reason to care is that working with Anduril could be a boon for Meta's Reality Labs division — home to its VR and AR teams, along with CEO Mark Zuckerberg's "metaverse" ambitions more broadly. Reality Labs has racked up cumulative operating losses north of $60 billion since late 2020, including a hefty $4.2 billion loss in the company's first quarter. In recent years, Wall Street has generally given Meta a pass on the Reality Labs losses — the stock is up more than 430% since the start of 2023. To be sure, that follows a brutal 2022 in which Meta shares lost nearly two-thirds of their value, driven in part by investor concerns about Zuckerberg's aggressive spending. But since then, the market has largely glossed over the Reality Labs losses thanks to Zuckerberg's intense focus on efficiency across the entire company, including steep job cuts, and the strong performance of its core Facebook and Instagram businesses. At the same time, investors also have gained an improved understanding on where Zuckerberg's controversial metaverse vision fits into the grand scheme of things. While Zuckerberg's north star may still be some form of the metaverse — a virtual world where people hang out, play, and shop — there is a recognition that the technology needed to get us there is artificial intelligence. AI, of course, has very real-world applications today, and Meta is investing heavily in it. AI is already delivering improvements to its bread-and-butter advertising business through improved ad targeting. Meta's Reality Labs has picked up some smaller successes along the way, most notably the AI-infused smart glasses made in collaboration with Ray-Ban. But, as the first-quarter results showed, the glasses haven't led to a materially improved financial picture for that division. And because we've seen Wall Street grow anxious before over the Reality Labs losses, we wouldn't be surprised to see it happen again without a better understanding of its future. That's where teaming up with Anduril comes into play. The partnership revolves around the U.S. government's Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS) contract. This 10-year, $22 billion contract was initially awarded to Club name Microsoft in 2021. In late 2024, Microsoft partnered with Anduril to incorporate the latter's "Lattice" operating system onto Microsoft's mixed reality HoloLens platform. Then, earlier this year, Microsoft opted to hand control of the contract over to Anduril, giving it "oversight of production, future development of hardware and software, and delivery timelines," according to a press release. In exchange, Microsoft's Azure became Anduril's preferred cloud-computing destination for all IVAS-related workloads and Anduril's AI technologies. Anduril has named its next-generation IVAS product EagleEye. We're not arguing that the Anduril partnership will be a financial needle mover in the near term. However, if the effort proves successful — and betting against either Zuckerberg or Luckey has never proven a good bet — it provides a pathway to generate a stable source of Reality Labs sales from the U.S. government, and that means operating losses in the division should improve, assuming expenses remain under control. The move should also help further diversify the company's overall revenue stream, which is almost entirely reliant on social media ads, in the years to come. While Meta has proven to still be a fantastic outlet for advertisers, revenue diversification in the era of AI is a good thing to see. Consumer behaviors are already evolving — consider the way hundreds of millions of people are turning to AI chatbots, threatening online ad competitor Alphabet's core internet search business — and who knows what other changes could be in store. At a higher level, Meta's work with Anduril points to a continued shift in the private company/government partnerships. Some Silicon Valley tech giants have historically been hesitant to contract with the U.S. military out of fear of retaliation from consumers, employees, or both. However, we are now seeing top U.S. tech companies become more open to government partnerships. Indeed, late last year, Meta said it made its Llama AI model " available to U.S. government agencies and contractors working on national security applications." Zuckerberg also has taken steps to improve his relationship with President Donald Trump. In an interview on the Core Memory podcast released shortly after Thursday's news became public, Luckey shared some interesting thoughts on how Anduril can leverage all the money that Meta has so far invested to build products like the Ray-Ban glasses and Quest headsets: "What we're doing is working with Meta to take the building blocks that they've invested enormous amounts of money and expertise in, and we're able to use those building blocks in EagleEye without having to recreate them ourselves. There's things that Anduril probably could do if we were willing to put billions of dollars of taxpayer money into it. I think we could convince the Army to give us a lot of money to recreate these things, but why would you do that when they've already been made? Why spend five years doing something when it's already been done in the consumer sector? ... They do have a lot of intellectual property and building blocks that they've built that are just as useful on the battlefield as they are on the head of any consumer." That's not to say that Meta is going to start developing military-grade hardware, but this does offer up an opportunity to further monetize its massive investment in research and development (R & D) by licensing out whatever consumer-grade hardware and software may be useful to Anduril as it looks to build out the final product. On the same podcast, Luckey said Anduril and Meta have already been working closely together for the better part of a year, relying entirely on private funding for the initiative during that time. This is particularly notable because it suggests that Meta does not need to ramp up hiring overnight to handle the work with Anduril, potentially adding expenses to Reality Labs. It's already been ongoing. Bottom line Meta's partnership with Anduril represents an encouraging — albeit incremental — move in addressing the large Reality Labs losses, which could fuel additional earnings growth for the company. Just how significant a contribution this effort becomes, of course, depends on Anduril's ability to make EagleEye a success with widespread U.S. military adoption. On the podcast, Luckey said Anduril's intent is to deliver first prototypes to the Army this year, "if all goes according to plan the way that I hope." So, as with the Ray-Ban glasses, we may not see the fruits of this effort on Meta's next earnings report or even the next few after that. But there is now a more clear path for Reality Labs to start pleasing skeptical investors. (Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust is long META and MSFT. See here for a full list of the stocks.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust's portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Meta Partners With Anduril to Develop XR Headsets for US Military
This story was originally published on Social Media Today. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Social Media Today newsletter. Yeah, this sounds totally normal and safe and not a risk to anybody or anything at all, while also being totally on-brand for 2025. Today, Meta, in partnership with XR company Anduril, has announced a new project which will see the two companies design new VR and AR elements for American military troops. As per Anduril: 'Anduril and Meta are partnering to design, build, and field a range of integrated XR products that provide warfighters with enhanced perception and enable intuitive control of autonomous platforms on the battlefield. The capabilities enabled by the partnership will draw on more than a decade of investment by both companies in advanced hardware, software, and artificial intelligence.' So Meta's now building tech to help the U.S. Defense Force in field battles. Sounds fine, all good, should be a good use of Meta's data. And the deal does, of course, make logical sense. Meta's made significant advancements in AR and VR technologies, especially in regards to compacting the key elements of such into smaller, more lightweight units, primarily to enhance consumer utility. Anduril, meanwhile, is focused on developing the next generation of military technology, and was founded by former Meta VR chief Palmer Luckey, who brings vast expertise and experience on this front. Though Luckey also has a controversial history, which includes being fired from Meta back in 2016 for making donations to a questionable pro-Trump group. Well, Luckey claims that was the reason, though Meta has refuted the idea that his political leanings were to blame for his unscheduled departure. But either way, Meta and Luckey moved away from each other due to differences in opinion of some sort, which they're now seemingly willing to work through as part of this new project. So what, exactly, will Meta and Anduril be working on? According to The Washington Post, the main initial focus will be a new military headset, as part of a project called 'EagleEye.' Anduril, which took over development of the U.S. Army's Integrated Visual Augmentation System (IVAS) from Microsoft in February, is looking to advance the project beyond Microsoft's original version, which had been built upon Microsoft's HoloLens 2 device. The Anduril version will incorporate night-vision and thermal-sensing, along with advanced augmented reality capabilities. Which is where Meta comes in. As noted, Meta has already developed a range of new chips and processing units for its coming AR glasses, and has made significant advances in compact AR tech. Meta's main aim with this is to build AR glasses that can be worn around in your day-to-day life, reducing weight, while also making them more stylish looking. And while style is less of a concern in combat situations, weight and processing power is important, which is why the new partnership with Anduril makes sense. It just feels a little off to be letting Meta into the military, right? Like, they already have all of our data, and they're building AI systems on the back of such. If there were ever a pathway to T-800 type Terminator robots, this could well be it (T-800 being the Arnold type, not the shapeshifting T-1000). Sci-fi hypotheticals aside, the partnership will be beneficial, and both Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg and Luckey have expressed their excitement in working with each other again. So, soon soldiers will be able to post IG Stories updates from the field, by simply speaking a few commands into their headset. Should be fine. Right?
