YDreams’ Visitors’ Center for Santander features in AICEP’s (Portugal’s Trade & Investment Agency) new promo video! YDreams comes in at 3:05m

We were excited to hear that on a March 6th visit to the Brazilian pavilion at CeBIT 2012, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and German Chancellor Angela Merkel sat down to try out the Alphabet Table, an augmented reality educational game, conceived and developed by YDreams for Positivo Informática, one of Brazil’s largest computer and educational technology manufacturers.

As you can see in the photo below, Dilma and Angela actually completed an activity using the didactic tool to better understand and experience what the innovative Alphabet table has to offer young learners.

The Educational Alphabet Table, which was also awarded a Gold in the Informatics category by IDEA/Brasil in August 2011, an organization endorsed by the Industrial Designers Society of America, works by combining colorful animations, video and sound to create an interactive environment. The table features a webcam, 32 inch LCD screen and Augmented Reality markers that represent characters in the story. The 2D markers are captured by the camera and transformed into real-time 3D images, which can be treated as “virtual marionettes” on an LCD screen. The educational game, which can be played by up to six students at a time, is ideal for promoting collaboration, exchanging knowledge, and teaching children and students with special needs their “ABC’s”.

Ynvisible (YDreams’ first spinout company) in collaboration with Enfucell and IDTechEx, produced close to 1600 interactive badges to distribute to participants and attendees at the upcoming Printed Electronics USA 2011 tradeshow.

Ynvisible's Interactive Badge for the Printed Electronics Tradeshow

The badges contain three interactive graphic layers, activated by the push of a button. Each layer, designed specifically for the event, conveys IDTechEx’s marketing messages. Technologically, the interactive badges are a hybrid solution, based on a combination of printed electronics  ̶  Ynvisible’s electrochromics-based interactive graphics and Enfucell’s SoftBattery®  ̶  and traditional electronics, namely the printed circuit boards, buttons and wiring. Designers from Ynvisible and IDTechEx jointly designed the interactive badges, with the final assembly of badges carried out by Ynvisible.

“The combination of established color printing and printed interactive graphics brings new levels of interaction and communication power to everyday items. Consumers who enjoy the interactivity of on-line content and services will now increasingly start to find such features also in printed products”, said Jani-Mikael Kuusisto, Chief Business Development Officer for Ynvisible.

IDTechEx Printed Electronics USA 2011 conference and tradeshow is the biggest event in the world on the topic. This year’s tradeshow will be the largest Printed Electronics exhibition to date, with 105 exhibiting companies already confirmed. The tradeshow is on from November 30th to December 1st, 2011 at the Santa Clara Convention Centre.

The following video gives us a comprehensive overview of printed electronics spin-out Ynvisible and its relationship to parent-company YDreams:

This past Monday, December 13th, Belmonte’s Museu dos Descobrimentos, dedicated to exploring one of the greatest feats in the era of the Portuguese discoveries, was distinguished with the 2010 Innovation and Creativity Award by the Portuguese Museological Association for its museological strategy and content development.

Belmonte’s museological strategy and contents were developed by cultural management firm Arque Hoje, with YDreams responsible for devising and implementing high-end interactive solutions that enable visitors to interact with the exciting contents and information.

A creative mix of art, design and technology span the 16 rooms that were once home to Pedro Alvares Cabral, the Portuguese navigator and explorer, who led the armada that discovered Brazil at the onset of the 16th century. The museum has been open to the public since April 2009.

The video below shows what the museum is about:

Back in October 2009 YDreams announced its new partnership with Montreal-based Green Vision Media (GVM), a hospitality experience solution provider with whom we co-developed James(TM) a Lifestyle Concierge product.

James(TM) is a mobile application catered specifically to the needs of travelers and hotel guests. It pretty much enables guests to find all sorts of information about the hotel and local area while also accessing interactive concierge services. James(TM) applications are cross-compatible with mobile platforms, allowing guests to access hotel information and services even when they are not in their rooms.

Recently GVM announced a partnership with LodgeNet Interactive, a leading provider of media and connectivity solutions for the hospitality industry, and Sqaure Group, a premium Apple Reseller, to ensure that James (TM) become a staple service in in-room entertainment systems at some of the world’s most prestigious hotel chains.

Through an exclusive agreement between Lodgenet and GVM, James(TM) the Lifestyle Concierge wil be made available to hotel guests via LodgeNet’s Premium IPTV solution, which also integrates the Apple® Mac mini in the rooms to provide guests with interactive services and Web browsing.

LodgeNet operates in the United States, Canada and México, serving close to 1.9 million hotel rooms, thereby reaching close to 500 million travelers annually. Sqaure Group covers Europe as the United Kingdom’s largest Apple Reseller. By incorporating James(TM) into their service offerings, the ‘LifeStyle Concierge’ is well on its way to becoming a unique global product in the hospitality sector.

Recently YDreams partnered with North American firm Canesta to produce its latest Augmented Reality 3D demo for CES 2010 in Las Vegas.

Portuguese TV program ‘Futuro Hoje’, hosted by Lourenço Medeiros, dedicated to covering the latest technology has to offer, visited the company to see for themselves what we were up to. More in the video below:

YDreams’ CEO, António Câmara, Ivan Franco and Inês Henriques sat down with ‘Falar Global’, a program on SIC Notícias. which looks at the impact information and knowledge technologies have on our daily lives.

The interview covers a range of topics that include YDreams’ take on what we can expect from televisions of the future, as well as the company’s work in the field of augmented reality, and in transforming the objects and surfaces around us into screens people can interact with.

For more see video!

António Câmara, YDreams’ CEO, and I headed out to Vegas for some gambling and a couple of speaking engagements at the Digital Signage Expo starting on February 24th.

Day One started with the Seminar Revolutionizing Interactive Marketing in Public Spaces – the Mobile and Gestural Digital Signage Imperative. It was great to have a whole seminar dedicated to new types of interaction in Digital Signage. The list of speakers was a who’s who of the interactive world – Razorfish, Gesturetek, Total Immersion – and the discussion was lively and significant. Read the rest of this entry »

Another great piece of news, as we get to the end of 2008, Fluviário de Mora won the Best Portuguese 2008 Museum award.

Together with Teixeira Duarte (construction), Promontório (architecture) and Henrique Cayatte (design), YDreams was responsible for the only (but massive) interactive installation of the museum. We created an interactive wall featuring an interface similar to the ones we use on our yMagic line of products, but seamlessly integrated into the modules.

YDreams’ CEO, António Câmara, chats with Camilo Lourenço, host of Portuguese financial news show ‘A Cor do Dinheiro’, about the company’s short and long term goals. Clip also includes footage from a typical workday at YDreams’ headquarters in Lisbon.

International news and current affairs channel, France 24, did a special Portugal day, where YDreams was featured as a success company story.

Besides the usual interviews, you can also glimpse a bit of life at the office, which includes scooters, an RC Helicopter and quasi-Olympic table tennis expertise.

You can read and watch the story here:

http://www.france24.com/en/20080930-y-dreams-a-portuguese-success-story-interactivity-science-researchers&navi=REPORTAGES

Or here, if you’d rather watch it in French.