Senior exec jumping ship suggests Magic Leap close to launch, HTC Vive significantly less advanced

UploadVR reports that Magic Leap has poached Jeff Gattis, the global marketing head of HTC’s Vive, a virtual reality headset expected to ship by the end of the year.

Comments made by Gattis add fuel to speculation that Magic Leap’s own VR headset is close to launch, but also suggest that it is significantly more advanced than the HTC product he’s been pushing for the past eight months … 

I think what struck me so much about Magic Leap was the quality of the technology and seeing how far along it was. I knew there was a great vision but I didn’t know how far along the technology was and how close it is to becoming real and commercial.

While we’ve been extremely impressed with what we’ve seen of Vive so far, Gattis seems to be suggesting that the Google-backed Magic Leap has a significant edge in the experience it delivers.

Gattis, however, isn’t worried about the HTC Vive’s potential, saying “I think they can be successful” with its launch. “I love what they’re doing,” he says, “I love what Oculus is doing for that matter. But I think [Magic Leap] is different and the potential for some of the use casing is broader.”