Razer's OSVR program has been on a roll since its inception in January. Recently, it nabbed new partners such as Ubisoft and Leap Motion, but the company also wants to use OSVR for educational purposes which was the impetus for the creation of the OSVR Academia Program. When it was first introduced, I speculated that the applications for the education-based program would be slim, but the company's recent academic institution buy-ins have proved me wrong.
The latest list shows 28 universities in eight countries each getting 10 Development Hacker Kits as well as the source code for OSVR. Listed below are the international universities that will receive OSVR.
Cracow University of Technology, PolandHamburg University of Applied Sciences, GermanyIstituto Auxologico Italiano, Italy Università Catholic del Sacro Cuore, ItalyVienna University of Technology, Austria Universitat de Barcelona, SpainRyerson University, CanadaThe Art Institute of Vancouver, CanadaYork University, CanadaUniversity College London, United KingdomUniversity of Portsmouth, United Kingdom
Even with several international schools picking up OSVR, the largest number of adopters are all universities in the United States -- a total of 17 schools so far.
Desert Research InstituteIowa State UniversityJohns Hopkins UniversityNara Institute of Science and TechnologyNorth Dakota State UniversityOhio UniversityRensselaer Polytechnic InstituteUniversity of California, BerkeleyUniversity of California, RiversideUniversity of California, San DiegoUniversity of Central FloridaUniversity of MinnesotaUniversity of New MexicoUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel HillUniversity of Texas at DallasVirginia TechWichita State University
The list includes two high-profile schools; Johns Hopkins University, which is known for its medical research, and the University of California, Berkeley, which boasts a prestigious science and technology program.
Although many of these schools have prominent technology programs, it's good to see that there are schools that may want to use OSVR from an artistic or medical standpoint. It will be interesting to see what each of these schools can do with OSVR, but as far as Razer is concerned, these early adopters can give OSVR serious academic backing, which in turn could attract even more schools (and bright, eager young minds) to the VR game.
The OSVR Academia program is by no means limited to the above schools, though. Razer was clear that it wants as much involvement as possible. Interested parties can sign up for the program here.
Follow Rexly Peñaflorida II @Heirdeux. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.
