VR startup Jaunt unveils 360-degree Neo camera for high-end VR movie production, will lease the device to partners starting in August
JAUNT GIVES FIRST LOOK AT VR CAMERA CODENAMED … Eric Johnson / Re/code : In Google's Vision of Virtual Reality, Where Does Jaunt Fit? Fergal Gallagher / Tech Times : Jaunt's NEO Is The First Pro-Grade Camera For VR Movies Tracey Lien / Los Angeles Times : Jaunt's latest virtual reality camera says goodbye to GoPros Janko Roettgers / Variety : Jaunt Announces New Virtual Reality Camera, Hints At Licensing Plans Peter Rubin / Wired : The Wild Camera Rig That Could Finally Crack VR Filmmaking Fred O'Connor / ITworld.com : Jaunt shows high-end VR camera for professionals Paul James / Road to VR : Jaunt Reveals “NEO”, 360 Degree Light Field Camera for “Professional-Grade” Cinematic VR Kyle Wiggers / Digital Trends : The Jaunt Neo is a beast of a virtual reality camera rig, but it could be the best yet Kevin Eva / VRFocus : Cinematic VR Takes Step Forward As Jaunt Announces First Pro Grade VR Camera Brendan Klinkenberg / BuzzFeed : VR Company Jaunt Made Its Own Camera
Context & Ripple Effects
Jaunt has been building toward this from both directions at once: two months ago it launched an LA VR movie studio staffed by Lucasfilm alums (Lucasfilm alums joined to open the LA studio), giving it content demand for a professional-grade camera. The NEO answers that need in-house, replacing the GoPro rigs the earlier coverage describes, and the lease model means partners rent capture capability rather than buy it.
The competitive frame matters: within months, GoPro shipped its own $15K Odyssey rig (GoPro's $15K Odyssey rig launched that November) and Nokia put the $60K OZO up for pre-order, so Jaunt chose leasing over selling in an increasingly crowded pro-VR camera field.
First-order effects
- Production partners get high-end 360-degree capture without a capital purchase starting in August, tying their output to Jaunt's ecosystem rather than owning gear outright.
- Jaunt's own studio operation becomes the first customer, vertically integrating camera, software, and the Lucasfilm-alum content team under one roof.
Second-order effects
- Rivals selling hardware outright — GoPro's $15K Odyssey and Nokia's $60K OZO — face pressure to match the lease structure or justify ownership costs against a rental alternative.
- Hollywood money validated the space: weeks after the unveil, Jaunt closed a $65M round led by Disney, signaling that studios wanted exposure to exactly this integrated camera-and-content play.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, professional VR capture consolidates around full-stack platforms (camera plus software plus studio) backed by entertainment capital rather than standalone device vendors.
- In practice the model proved fragile: by 2019 Verizon bought only Jaunt's software and technology assets while the company pivoted to AR (Verizon acquired Jaunt XR's software assets), suggesting the leased-hardware bet never became a durable business even with Disney-scale backing.
The trend: Professional VR filmmaking in 2015 was consolidating into Hollywood-backed, vertically integrated platform companies — a wave whose peak funding and eventual asset-sale unwind bracket Jaunt's NEO as a marker of both ambition and the segment's limits.