Appy Pie launches its VR and AR app builder for startups and small businesses

VR and AR are on the tip of everyone’s tongues these days. Well, VR certainly is. AR still has a way to go before it becomes part of the mainstream psyche.

But barriers remain for marketers who want to take advantage of the latest trends in VR, 360-degree video, and AR. How — especially when you have a startup or a small business — do you get into this exciting and engaging new field without spending a very real fortune?

Today, Appy Pie — producers of cloud-based mobile app builder software — has launched its VR and AR product to solve this exact problem.

The solution includes an easy-to-use design platform that allows you to create VR and AR apps that let you promote 360-degree still images, 360-degree video, and AR solutions. The AR apps are similar, in many ways, to those you’ve seen that overlay geographical data on the real world, showing points of interest, which makes them particularly useful for events and companies that have a brick-and-mortar presence.

“To garner interest and enhance customer experience, it is crucial for small to medium-sized businesses and startups to take action with the various types of technology that are out there,” Abhinav Girdhar, CEO at Appy Pie, told me. “The main issue is that incorporating technology such as AR and VR is costly, which is why I wanted to feature it in our DIY app platform and allow users to have the same capabilities as bigger companies so they can leverage the competitive playing field.”

By adding VR and AR features into its do-it-yourself platform, Appy Pie gives startups and smaller businesses a chance to add immersive experiences into their iOS and Android apps. And the platform is available to everyone, regardless of whether the marketer has coding experience or not.

“Businesses need to keep up with their competitors to stay relevant,” Girdhar said. “After companies saw how successful an app such as Pokémon Go was with its AR feature, they jumped on the opportunity to reach their customers better. It is imperative for SMBs to do the same.”

The AR option features image recognition and tracking that gives app users the ability to scan and recognize everyday real-world objects, track positions, and augment the display of the object, while the VR solution provides users with panoramic and 360 videos for real-world experiences in a virtual world from anywhere and at any point in time.

App creators can add any 360-degree video, 3D models, images, and entire HTML snippets, either by uploading them to the Appy Pie platform or by inserting the link of a 360-degree YouTube video.

Appy Pie customers can start using the new AR and VR app builder here. The new features are built into the existing Appy Pie app maker, and pricing varies, with a basic option starting at $15 per month.