Niantic has hired the long-time Oculus employee Dan Morris. He will be joining the company as the new Director of Developer Relations.
This is in response to Niantic ramping up their new Lightship AR platform for third-party developers.
This new platform will enable developers to create their own games and experiences with the technology powering Pokémon Go.
The most recent example of these games are Transformers: Heavy Metal and the new Pikmin AR mobile game.
Dan Morris had been working at Oculus for six years in total. Four as the Head of Store, and another two as the Head of Developer Relations.
“There’s no other job in the world that I would have left for but this one,” Dan Morris said.
“This is a planet-sized opportunity for thousands of developers, given the size of the global smartphone installed base. Apps built with Lightship are going to change the world, and I’m really eager to get developers underway on their journey.”
Dan Morris’ role at Niantic will be focusing on interfacing with developers who are using Niantic’s Lightship AR development platform.
The platform is currently in private beta but they’re gearing up for a public release. We’ve previously covered the Lightship ARDK here.
In addition to this, Niantic has also been teasing their own AR smartglasses! Could you imagine a pair of AR glasses dedicated to their games?
To stay up to date with all things augmented reality, you should follow our Twitter! You can also read the press release from Niantic here.