Immertec’s technology involves placing special cameras in an operating room. During a surgical procedure, doctors in other locations can use a Medoptic-enabled headset to watch the surgery in 180-degree 3-D VR. Users also can talk to one another remotely, ask questions and zoom in on the patient’s surgical site. Dean, now Immertec’s acting chief medical officer, regularly performs endoscopies that are livestreamed via the Medoptic platform.
Immertec’s competitive advantage is its speed: The network lag — the length of time it takes for data to travel between the sender and receiver — is less than 200 milliseconds, Maltais says.
“Our IP (intellectual property) is around compression and distribution. It’s exactly real time,” says Maltais. “You can ask questions, and there’s no lag time.” Immertec’s competitors use simulated training, he says — “you’d put on a headset and you’d practice surgery in a video game-like experience, or you’d watch a video recording.”
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