Nextech3D.AI Corporation (NEXCF) Earnings Call Transcript
January 11, 2024
Earnings Call Speaker Segments
And good morning or good afternoon, depending on where you are around the world. I'm Steve Darling from Proactive, welcoming you to another livestream event coming to you from our worldwide broadcast studio in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Again, thank you very much for being with us. We'll spend the next 45 minutes to an hour with Nextech3d.ai talking about their most recent announcement, which, of course, deals with their search engine and how that's going to work, and we'll talk about that and what's ahead in 2024, as well as some other things that they have on tap for this year. It sounds like it's going to be a pretty exciting hour, and we're excited to get along with it. And we're excited to have you with us as well. If you would like to make a comment or a question, we invite you to use the chat feature, and I'll be featuring those questions throughout the hour with our guests, which include the Head of Product Operations for Nextech, Hareesh Achi, and of course, the CEO, Evan Gappelberg, of Nextech3d.ai. So let's begin bringing in him, I'm talking about Evan. Evan Gappelberg, the CEO of Nextech3d.ai. And Evan, good to see you again. How are you?
Great. Great to be back with you again, Steve.
Yes. Happy New Year, and I know it was a pretty busy 2023, and you're looking at an equally busy 2024. You've already had news out about how busy it's been over the last little while. That was, today's news, as a matter of fact, seeing an 80% increase in productivity. So before we get to all that stuff, let's just talk about 2024 and just the excitement you have for the company.
Yes. I think it's important for our investors to keep their perspective about what they're invested in and why it's so valuable and what the future holds. If you look at 2023, we were talking a lot about AI and how AI was going to allow us to scale our productivity. We said we thought we can achieve roughly 80% reduction in our cost as we got into the end of 2023. And today's news is big. We announced ,80% increase in productivity. We're going to explain that a little bit more as we get on with the show, because it's actually better than an 80% increase in productivity. It's actually more like a 500% increase in productivity. It's an 80% reduction in time to create a 3D model. So if you think about time as the thing that's the variable, and you're able to reduce that by 80% to create one 3D model, that means you have a lot more time to create more 3D models in that same amount of time that it used to take you. So right now, I was just doing the math before the show, Steve, that we're actually up to like 500% increase in productivity using this new magical, somewhat mysterious technology called AI, and investors should really take notice. You're seeing the big cap companies like NVIDIA break to all-time highs, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, all these big tech companies, on the back of breakthrough AI. Well, Nextech also is participating with its breakthrough AI for 3D search. And really today's news speaks to that. We talked about this a year ago. This isn't like we're just playing into the news and media frenzy around AI. We've been talking about this for a year. And I think it's, again, important for investors to put things into perspective. I want to ask our investors. What makes Google such a valuable company? It's their search engine. Their search algorithm is, plus the data, is what makes it so valuable, a $1 trillion company. Everything follows from there. If you look at Amazon, you go into the Amazon platform and what do you experience? The world's most powerful product search engine. They actually have a name for it called A9. And we're going to let you guys vote on the name that we use for our 3D model search engine because we actually haven't come up with one yet, it's so new. But when you look at Amazon, they use product search engine as that's their secret sauce. That's where everybody goes to the Amazon platform. They know what you're looking for. If you look at Google, they use their search engines so you could search the web. Now you have ChatGPT, which again is worth $100 billion or more. Why? Because they're searching the Internet and actually collating data and creating value by being able to use all the information that's on the net. And so again, Nextech has now launched its search engine. We haven't publicly launched it, but we're going to talk about that, again, in a few minutes. Because the real magic here is that we're using our existing database of many, many, tens of thousands of 3D meshes that we've created over the last few years. Remember, we couldn't actually do what we set out to do until we had enough scale, enough meshes and 3D models, to feed our AI algorithm. And so we have that now. We're expanding that, quite rapidly and quite dramatically. And as we expand that, the AI gets stronger, our lead in the industry becomes larger, our valuation should follow. And so that's really the story with today's news, is that you have to put things into perspective. You can't just think of Nextech as the singular search engine for mesh. You have to think of it in terms of, well, how does this fit into the whole investment landscape? And my opinion is that we are not getting the proper valuation for what we've created. I think that's going to change, and it could be quite material once we release this to the public, because the business model is not just about Nextech using this technology in-house. It's actually about letting others use it, and there's a lot more others out there that create 3D models as well that could pay us for production. So that's kind of the story, Steve, where AI is the secret sauce, but you got to have the data. We've connected those two together and now we have this AI search engine.
So Evan, obviously, lots of questions coming in around this. And I think this is a really good one. This is from Larry, how you generate revenue from this. And you mentioned a moment ago that one of the ways you do it is by, I guess, licensing it or -- sorry...
Yes. Steve, we have a whole presentation. We're going to take people step-by-step through our -- we're actually going the demo the search engine again, and Hareesh is going to do that for us. It works phenomenally well. I mean I'm kind of blown away at how well it works. So I want him to demo that on our platform. I'm going to go into the business and explain how we make money. And we're going to talk about the relaunch of Toggle and how that plays into the same story line. And we're going to also talk about Apple's VisionPro and how that impacts ARway. So there's a lot of ground to cover today.
Yes. I'm a journalist so I'd like to get to the nuts and bolts right away. So there you go. I understand there's a show part of it, I get it, so. Well, let's take it in order. Let's bring Hareesh Achi, your Head of Product in with us. Hareesh, good to see you again. How are you?
Good to see you, Steve, I'm doing well.
Good stuff. So let's talk about how this all works. Let's talk about that first, right, Evan?
Yes. So if we could pull up my deck, I think it is like a slide or 2. I don't know if I need to do it or you guys -- oh, there it is. Look at that. So let's -- do we -- do I need to move it to the next page or do you guys do that?
Yes. You move to the next page. Yes, go ahead.
Okay. I think you have to do it.
No, you just have to do it. You just move it to the next page.
Okay. Let's see. All right. Hold on a second. I have to do it. There we go. I did it. So breakthrough AI-powered 3D model search engine. The AI-based search engine is now -- we were using an image. So you basically shown a picture of here, you have a camera, and then it searches the database for the closest match. But you can also use text, right, Hareesh? That we're integrating -- yes, we're integrating the text-based prompt, so that you could search the library of hundreds of thousands of models and parts and then it recommends the closest match. And again, the key to this is the better the search results, the more valuable your search engine is. And we're seeing some really phenomenal results. Again, we're going to demo that in just a second. But I actually want to -- could you just jump 2 pages? It keeps jumping around. Okay. So I just want to highlight the productivity, this massive increase in productivity. Today's news was actually a little bit, let's say -- it spoke about the 80% increase in productivity, but I actually went back and did the math as I got ready for this presentation, and realized it's a 500% increase in productivity, so. It's not a bad thing. But let me just explain. If it takes an artist 2 hours to make, let's say, a single 3D model, and we're able to save 80% of the time because we're pulling up from our existing mesh library a very similar 3D model. Well, let's say, 2 hours is 120 minutes, and it only took them 20% of that, right, because we have an 80% time saving, so it's 24 minutes. And so that leaves them, all that additional time, which means in the same -- 120 minutes, rather, they can make 5 3D models as opposed to one. That's huge. That is huge. And that is the increase in productivity, not the 80%. So with that, rather than show this video, I'd like for us to switch -- because this video really is of the search engine on the platform, that's what this is. But instead of doing the video, I decided, you know what, let's actually show the actual search engine. So are we able to have Hareesh jump in and demo?
Yes, we've got Hareesh up there. We'll bring your demo up there as well, and you can sort of take us through how all this works, and we'll get that on stage right now and go from there. So there you have it. So now you're looking inside -- explain to us what we're looking at, Hareesh.
Yes. So I'll walk you through like those videos and screens that are not showing, so I'll show it in action here. So what we are looking at is all our -- all the work, jobs that we have within our portal. This is our portal where all our team members work. So what I'm going to show you is basically we'll look at one of these models, this chair here. So I want to show you guys how we do the search and how the search is so quick and responsive. So when Evan talks about this productivity numbers, I want you to connect to that. So right. We come to this detailed page of this job. You get to see all the various pictures that are available for this job, right? These are all 2D images. We have this mesh database search that we have.
Hareesh, I just want to point out, not to interrupt you. But that mesh database search -- go back one screen. That is the search engine. We've integrated it. This is something brand new. This did not exist -- how many was it, a week since this is live? That button did not exist. Yes. So it's literally that button -- yes.
Yes, that was literraly new. That's the new feature. That's what our AI mesh search engine, that stuff, all the things that we integrated into the platform. And like that's where, again, kind of back to those productivity numbers, when we talk how quick and easy is it, right? Every artist, everyone who is working in our team, he's on this portal. They are looking at these and trying to build the 3D model like this. Well, before they [indiscernible] they want to search, they got these images. They say, okay, let me go and search for this one. So when you click on it, so it pops up, I select the image, or I can even select all, but I select this one for now, and then hit search. And you can see it's happening real time right now, and it goes in and brings all the previous meshes that I have. So I click on this and see all this. This mesh looks exactly closer to the image that I have, and that's when I can easily say, this looks good, this is the exact same to the image that I have seen on the job, and this is already there. We know where it is, and where -- we know how it looks. And I can download the file.
Hareesh, just one question. When you say meshes, are you talking about like the texture of the chair or are you talking about the chair itself? Like, just so I can -- so I get the lingo correct here. So when you say you hit that button, the search engine, that's taking you to all the chairs that would look similar to the one you have, and that's what you classify as a mesh. Am I on the right track here? Am I right there, Evan?
That is correct. These are all the meshes that we work on. These are all the meshes that we worked on, and these are all that we already have in our database.
Okay, got it. Just wanted to know what mesh is.
Yes. So hold on. Hold on. So we know what we're talking about, Hareesh, but it's important that we go kind of slow here and explain what we're looking at for the investors. So you're right, Steve. So when you look at the images on screen, you're looking at the search engine's results. There's 1, 2, 3, 4 results that pop up based on that one image on the left. And it's up to the artist. I mean, so basically, the first one is what the AI perceives as the closest match. Then the second one is the second closest, the third one is the third. Now you might look at all of these and go, let's see, the one in the middle has the legs that look closest to my chosen image. While the seat and the seat back on the first one is the closest, the legs on the middle or the third one are closest. And you know what, I'm going to click on 2 or 3 so I have the parts that I could then assemble into that chosen image, right? So that's the magic. It's not even just one chair. You're getting multiple chairs that have multiple parts: the back, the seat, the legs. And then you're able to actually mix and match and point and click, put it together very, very quickly. You're not building from scratch. This is where you get that productivity enhancement. And again, as we build our library with more and more and more of these models and meshes, and as we build our algorithm, it gets better, faster, more accurate. And over time, it just becomes more and more valuable. So this is literally the, let's just call it, the earliest version. This is the slowest and the least accurate version of the platform that we're ever going to see. It's only going to get faster, stronger, better from here.
So in essence, when you say you have 4 examples of a chair, all of a sudden, you could have 10 down the road?
Well, you could, but you don't want -- you don't necessarily want 10, right, because -- you could. But the goal is actually to have this AI do the work. And if you have 10, then now you're putting some of the burden on the 3D model, right? So you really only want like a 3 top ones that have like 80% or more of a close match. And that's really what the AI figures out for you.
Okay, got it. All right.
And I think we give flexibility, to Evan's point, right if those 3 don't match or they are not too close, AI can keep going. So there are like, for this job, there are these many images, right? I can pick any one of them. So I can take this one, third one, and say, okay, let me try again. This is not even 5 seconds of results, like you can see, like quickly, how quickly it is coming back on the screen, and shows, oh, okay, here are all the other ones based on this image that you searched. So you can try different images that you have and see -- but you can see how the AI is bringing similar results because it sees the full chair, no matter how -- which direction the seat is in the 2D image, it can read it and bring, like you can see, I have searched 3 times now, same results. I can show another example as well here. This is a kettle, kind of think of your coffee, tea, hot water thing. Similar one. We do search, I select this, and then hit the search button.
Let's also be clear about something that I don't think our investors appreciate very much. We probably have something like $5 million worth of 3D models in our search engine. Maybe more. I haven't actually calculated it. But $5 million worth of value in the search engine in terms of 3D models that we've gotten paid for over time, right? So if you think about that, and it could be used to create $50 million or $500 million worth of value globally. And that's really what you got to kind of realize as an investor, is that there's all this value that we're now unlocking and unleashing. It was trapped inside of our database. We couldn't actually do anything, whether we make a 3D model, we sell it, and that's it. But now with this search engine, that same 3D model could be sold 1,000 times. It's not the same exact 3D model. It's the mesh that the artist is then tweaking. Because look at this coffee pot on screen. How many similar ones in the world are there, right? That's the thing, is that this is just the base case, and then the artist comes in and we'll adjust the color, the size, the shape. But it's the same -- it's a handle, it's a pot, it's got a spout, it's got to cover, right? And so that's where the value is, that there's all these 3D models, all these meshes that exist in our library that we're now monetizing.
Okay. All right. What's the next step here, Hareesh, what happens after this now?
Right. So once we download it is, so we searched, we downloaded. One of the things that I want obviously our artist wants, I know there are some questions on, Evan started as well on. Toggle, what does it mean, right? So we want -- we are going to connect this into the Toggle platform as well. So I want to show you how we can bring that, so that kettle that you are seeing earlier for the purpose of this demo, I brought it, downloaded that mesh from the portal, and upload it. Right now I have to do it manually, but that is the work that we are doing, was updates for Toggle, is that mesh search engine will be embedded into the Toggle itself. So you can do the search, bring it -- until now, Toggle was about CAD files, OVJ files, GLP files. What we can do now is we can bring in these meshes that we already have, you just bring a 2D image of your product, search our database, connect it. We'll connect it into the Toggle automatically. So you download from there into Toggle directly. So it shows up here. And you come in here and then you texture differently. You got to see the purple one, but now I want to change the texturing to something else. I want to do to something -- okay. I want this one to be [indiscernible].
Yes. Perfect. So Hareesh, I just want to point out, again for our investors who are not in the 3D modeling industry, that gray thing on screen is what's called the mesh, right? And that is the thing that our 3D model search engine is actually searching for. It's not the finished product. It pulls up the mesh. And then you take that mesh into Toggle, which is what Hareesh was demoing, and you're able -- and what does Toggle do? Toggle does the texturing, right? I think, Steve, you were asking about this. And so we have generative AI texturing capability. And then you have an AI search engine that allows you to pull in pretty much any product through our search engine or bring in your CAD file and then you can design it any which way you want, and then export this to your website and start selling.
So just to confirm on the Toggle part of it. So what it was done before, or what's being done, is that people would have to bring in their CAD files at, but what you're suggesting, Hareesh, if I'm reading you correctly, is that you're working on now that, if you're working within Toggle, there will soon be the ability to pull in what you're seeing on those meshes from your search engine directly into Toggle, correct?
Yes. Yes.
Okay. Is there a timeline for that or is that something that's happening this year or?
Yes. So that's part of my presentation actually.
Well, Hareesh was jumping ahead there, Evan. That's the reason why. So there you go.
Yes, I think I [indiscernible] so that connects there, right? So I want to show the product road map when you guys see it, right, and say, yes, the scope of the breadth of our product stack that we have helps you understand, right? As you -- it's not just search for 3D modeling and effectively optimizing our 3D modeling. It is now bringing that into Toggle. So our ecosystem of products are all connected with the search and the AI engine. And now you can even texture it, add a logo, like your own, as Evan was mentioning, the meshes are gray boxes basically. So that's where it is. And then you customize it to whatever color you want like here I'm showing a red kettle, the one you saw in the other image, it was a purple kind of kettle, right? So you can customize the kettle, put a logo. And here is where our revenue stream also adds on, is because now you want to customize it or do something additional, that's when it comes to a custom order for us through Toggle as well. And we can help -- you don't want the handle of the mesh that way, and you are not a 3D artist that you -- again, or a mesh engineer that you can edit it. We can do it for you. So those are all the value added services that gets enabled on top of this now, of our mesh, search engine, when you integrate this across our products.
Yes. I think if we go to my deck, unless you have more to demo, I think that's it, right, from the demo standpoint, Hareesh?
Yes, that's right. That's correct.
So let's switch over to the deck, Steve. There it is. So I'm going to skip this because this was the demo of essentially the search engine. So this is what we're looking at in terms of the business, right? We're launching soon. We don't have a date. But it's we're talking weeks, not months. The first AI-powered 3D model search engine. We're going to release it to the public and then we're going to charge a per-download basis. So we've reduced our cost in-house, but profits are still limited, right, to our clients, which everybody knows. And then if you look at our -- the global availability and the massive scale, it's a much, much larger ecosystem, right? We've pegged it at worth $100 billion over the next few years. Amazon alone has 300 million products. And so if you think about all of those having to go 3D, and we're going to charge somewhere between $1 to $10 per download, right? Because remember, in the end, they're going to end up with something that's worth as much as $100 or more. right? So to pay us $1 to $10 is a small fee. And so if you just do simple math, there's a massive, massive opportunity for us to monetize using our search engine. The new launch of Toggle, as Hareesh was talking about, is coming very soon. And the relaunch is going to include new features, which includes the AI-powered 3D model search engine, which Hareesh just showed you, plus we're going to be integrating with Blender. Now let's talk about what that means. Blender is the tech that all artists globally use to manipulate and create 3D model meshes. So if, let's say, we serve up a mesh inside of Toggle and we've integrated Blender into Toggle, you don't have to leave the Toggle platform. You can now increase the size of the leg or shorten the size of the leg, you could do your editing inside of Toggle. That was never available before. So you're not going to have to work on multiple platforms, and that's going to enable the entire 3D model production process to happen on the Toggle platform, which is huge. We're also going to have, of course, our existing tech the CAD to 3D converter, the AI texturing, text to 3D, material, all of that. So if you look at the business model and we charge, instead of as a SaaS business, which is where we were previously, we charge on a per-use basis. Think about $10, every month, 100,000 downloads, it's just an example, it could be more, it could be less per month, that's $1 million a month in revenue. If you think about that across all of the globe, that's not a big number to anticipate in terms of business. And again, texturing is what Toggle does really well. You bring it on the mesh, and then it adds the color or the design. Right now it's just a texturing tool, and in a very short amount of time in the next couple of weeks, when we relaunch, it's going to have a lot more features and functionality, which is going to add a tremendous amount of value. And again, here's like a chair just showing the texturing capabilities, which we all know. We're going to pivot now, unless there's some questions, Steve.
Yes. Yes, we do have some have a few questions that I think would be good to get to. One of which has to deal with patents, and talk about the importance of patents being put on all of this. And I know that you addressed that in a recent interview that we did just about the importance of patents.
Yes. So we filed a series, a portfolio of -- a portfolio of patents over 1.5 years ago. We received our first patent, I think, in Q4. Hareesh has been talking with the lawyers. And we think we're going to get another patent issued shortly in February. They've kind of broadcasted to us that it's likely to happen, that the communication with the Patent Trademark Office is leaning in that direction. And so we are anticipating more patents on our tech in Q1.
Okay. Also a question here about -- I don't know if you can actually answer this question, but I'll -- anyway. How many 3D models do you expect to deliver in Q1? I mean, obviously, you're talking about increased capacity. So I know you're not putting a number on it, but it will be dramatically more than we saw last year or?
Yes. We don't have a number. If you think about our presentation today, I want you to focus on the search engine and not on how many 3D models Nextech is going to produce, but how many mesh searches can -- how many downloads of the mesh can we generate in Q1 and Q2 and throughout 2024. I want to move people's attention away from just Nextech creating 3D models. I want investors to pay attention to the fact that we have technology that I believe is game changing that's going to allow us to offer this search engine to all of our competitors. We're going to open this up, because we think there's more money there. We think there's more money. It's like you can be -- if Google used the search for just themselves, or Amazon just themselves, or you open it up. So we're going to open it up. And that's going to, I think, open up a significant revenue opportunity for us. And I think that's what investors should be focused on, not how many models we're going to produce in Q1 or Q2 or Q3, or really even ever. Because there's way more production going on in the world than Nextech. We can't we can't get to everybody. And so we're really focused on building the tech that everybody uses. That is worth a lot more money.
Yes. A lot of questions about clients. Are you still working with a similar group of clients that you've talked about in the past?
Yes, nothing's changed. In fact, if anything, we've expanded our client base. I mean, everyone knows we service Amazon, everyone knows that we service Kohl's and Dyson, and everybody knows that we service over 150 SMEs. This is not new news. So we've expanded. We've announced expansion contracts with our existing customers. We announced William Wood and Artika. And there's just a lot of business that we've done and continuing to do. If anything, we expect more business in 2024 than we did in 2023. But again, I just want to stress that my goal when we started this 3D modeling journey was to build the technology that we could supply to others. In the beginning, we had to make the 3D models, we had to build the tech that allowed us to scale, we had to land the customers. We had to do all of that, and supply the customers and have the database and et cetera, customer service, and on and on and on. That's just what you have to do when you're first, when you're doing the pioneering work. But as we move into the next phase of growth in this industry, I believe that the big opportunity is in AI and our ability to be an AI platform that offers the meshes and the search for a fee. I think that's a bigger opportunity. I always thought that was a bigger opportunity. I've been waiting to come out and announce this to our investors, waiting to build it, thank God, Hareesh was able to deliver on that dream. Because until Hareesh came along, it really was just a dream we were working towards. I've spoken about it many, many times on your show, Steve. And now it's here. It's here. So our investors need to kind of pivot their attention, not that we're exiting the 3D modeling business. I didn't say that. We're still in the business. We're still making 3D models for our customers. We're still building them every single day. We still have our factory and our team. But if you -- and that's not -- there's no stopping that. But we want to really be the search engine that supplies the meshes globally. And I think that's a more valuable value prop for our investors long term than just making the 3D models ourselves.
So are you suggesting, Evan, that you're still going to be scaling up your operations like you've talked about in the past? Like that's still part of what -- this is in essence an add-on? Would that be a fair way to describe it?
Yes. It's an add-on, right? So we're not exiting any business right now. We're just adding to our existing business. And look, if our -- let's say, for argument's sake, our 3D model search engine starts generating more money and more profits than our 3D modeling business. If that happens, we have to make a strategic decision. If it's growing faster and generating more, why would we continue to be in the business that's slower and generating less, right? So it really is a question of what happens, and that's what kind of determines our decision-making. But from our standpoint, and I think investors, again, need to put this on their mental map, AI is the latest and greatest technology that humankind has ever seen and created. And so remember, we were making 3D models back in 2019. It was a pain in the ass business. It took a week to make. We couldn't scale, granted, but we've been making 3D models for quite a while now. What we haven't been able to do until now is have this AI search engine for our meshes and be able to monetize our existing database of meshes. That's what we have not. That's the new thing that we're talking about today. And that's what I think is going to, over time, become even more valuable, than just making the 3D models in-house ourselves.
Okay. There's a question here for Hareesh. I'll let you answer this. The question is, can you add 3D avatars and human holograms to Toggle and expand its capabilities so you can make 3D animated films? Is there other uses for that within Toggle. I think people are looking at, are there other things that you can do within that platform?
Yes. I think the potential is there, I would say. I think for now, I think, yes, can we add, yes, I think it's all in the 3D when you look at the back-end tech stack of that. At the end of the day, it's a 3D mesh, 3D file. So there is potential. We haven't explored into that yet. But yes, definitely, we'll consider that and see how we can expand. But yes, 3D avatars, holograms, and now that you have the mesh technology, it's all part of extension of that.
Okay. And we thought we should get a bit of an update on what's been going on with the building of the team in India as well. That's still -- last time we talked to you, you said you were about 70%, I think you were somewhere in that neighborhood of gearing up. So everything is still going well there?
I think we are almost 95% or more, I would say, now with the setup and setting, running the operations. It's all executing flawlessly. And so going super well.
Yes. And that's a big part of this, right, Evan?
It is. It is. We couldn't be more excited with what Hareesh has built in Hyderabad. It happened very quickly. I don't know if people realize this, but Hareesh really only started with us -- when was it, Hareesh? Like we set up in September, October, right? So it's really Q4 that he was setting this up. And now it's running and humming and helping us to become profitable in that business, which we are now. And we really are set up for scale, which is the key. But as I've mentioned again and again, in this interview, I'm extremely excited about the AI search engine because it has global reach. And that's the thing that adds tremendous value. Again, back to the Google, Amazon search engines that are out there, ChatGPT, even if you look at Instagram, I mean these are algorithms plus data that equal billion, trillion-dollar valuations. Nextech now has algorithms plus data. That's -- I mean I'm just trying to connect the dots for investors. The algorithm plus the data equals billion, in some cases, trillion-dollar valuations depending upon how much usage you get. So we're in the very beginning. We've had roughly 3,000 searches internally of using the mesh. You saw how easy it was with Hareesh. And we're going to have a public-facing version of that Toggle, which, again, is going to create more value for our shareholders. So lots of work being done by the Nextech team and a tremendous amount of value creation happening here with this AI-powered search engine. And with that, Steve, maybe, unless we have more questions, we could jump into Apple's VisionPro.
Yes, that was actually going to be the next one because, obviously, we just got a question on as a matter of fact. Plans to release all these apps for Apple VisionPro, now they're releasing the headset. So those are coming out February 2, I believe. So let's talk a little bit about Apple and the ProVision goggles and what that means.
Yes. So maybe we can move back to the deck real quick. So anyone that knows me knows that I've been caught up in the hype of Apple's glasses going back to 2019. I think I fell in love with the whole concept in 2018, when I founded Nextech, that you would be able to see 3D and a spatial world really through a pair of glasses. And so ARway was created to take advantage of that. That's really -- ARway is a spatial computing platform. And we actually started this, with the original founders, going back to 2021. So think about that. We're in 2024 and Apple's releasing this. And so we truly are pioneers. I think, again, it's important for our investors to realize that they've invested in pioneering companies doing pioneering work in new technologies that really haven't developed a market yet, and that's the opportunity. And so ARway is now gaining traction. And while that's happening, we're seeing the technology start to emerge. And really Apple, everyone should understand, when Apple, the most valuable tech company on the planet, comes out with a new product, no matter what the naysayers say, I don't care, you guys should not care what the naysayers say, there's always naysayers. Who's going to wear these goggles? It's ridiculous. Blah, blah, blah. If you're betting against Apple, you're a fool. You're just a fool, you're not going to win, okay? We are putting all of our chips on Apple. And we're going to win. The Vision Pro is going to push ARway's AR navigation into the mainstream. It's already happening. You guys, our investor base, please pay attention. We get inbound leads from airports, these are significant travel hubs from universities, from hospitals, from governments, from stadiums, all looking to use our spatial computing platform ARway in test environments. They're preparing for it going mainstream. They want to get their feet wet, they're dipping their toes in to our pioneering technology. Again, we've been building this for years now. So this news, February 2, Apple is launching the VisionPro glasses for spatial computing, is huge for our industry. It is massive. It is -- I can't -- I'm not going to hype it any more than it's already being hyped in the media, other than to say it really is a big deal. And you asked a question about the app. The ARway app and SDK for Vision Pro, go to the App Store. We're already in the App Store. We're already in Apple's App Store. All new App Store -- Apple is actually changing their terminology. They're not going to call the apps that work on the VisionPro, apps. They're calling them spatial apps. They want to call it a spatial computing. It's not even an app. They're calling it something different. There's a new name that they're using to differentiate the old apps that work on your phones and the new ones that they're renaming as spatial -- I forget what it is called spatial something, which just gives you an idea of how big a pivot, how big a transformation is about to happen in the computing world. AI is the story that everybody is focused on and rightly so. Rightly so. But spatial computing is going to be the thing that I think people are going to be surprised about how it takes over when, again, you start using ARway's indoor navigation, you have 3D experiences, you have augmented reality advertising, augmented reality movies, augmented reality everything. Everything is going AR. And if you're not -- if you don't have AR, you're going to be left behind. If you don't have a 3D model, if you don't have augmented reality Wayfinding in your mall, people will not go. If you don't have augmented reality at your university, people will not go to your university. If you don't have it at the airport, people are going to go to some other airport. It's just going to be that big a deal. And so we could play this video real quick, I think.
Yes. Just before we do that, Evan, I want to -- someone -- so one of those naysayers suggested, they're not glasses, they're actually goggles. So give a real-world use case of an individual who would actually wear goggles walking around a mall or a museum. Now I agree with you, I think Apple doesn't really take a lot of missteps, and I'm not sure this is a misstep in Apple's world.
No.
Let me add, Evan, quickly there. Right. I think, yes, it's called -- technology-wise, they call technology evolution, right? So even Apple -- iPhone first iPhone, if you think of going back, way back to 2010, '11, it was small, plenty, okay, it took some okay pictures, and we did it. And where we are now? So it's an evolution. I think the strategy that we are playing is with Apple is about we are being part of it with Apple over there on that journey. We know those goggles are going to get smaller as well. But our SDK, our integration is happening right now. So the way we see it is, as the journey moves along and the evolution of these devices happens, we are already there, and we will be evolving along with it. And the new hardware enables us even more, right? If anyone -- there will always be enthusiasts who will wear these now and can walk around in the goggle in the mall. These are see-through. The goggles can be see-through. You can see through the goggles. So there will be enthusiasts who can wear and walk, and our SDK enables them with the map, same thing as it goes. So that's where how we see it, this will play out.
Yes, exactly. And thank you, Hareesh. I think our naysayer is missing the point here. This isn't about a singular device at a single moment in time. Let's be clear on how these things work. There's a script. There's a playbook. You launch an expensive product, which is what Apple is doing. The first iPhones that came out, I think, were like $1,500 or something, I don't know. The first iPads, the first even the music device, I forget what that is called.
iPod?
iPod. Yes. Everything was expensive. And I don't know if you remember the first iPod that had the wheel, the thing was like a brick. And it had like the screen was very -- it was like gray and kind of boring. And so listen, the people who are going to buy this, you'll have the enthusiasts, like me, and then you'll have enterprise. So let's be clear. The enterprise customers are going to be buying Apple's glasses, and they're going to be using them in business use cases to see what's possible. What is possible? What can happen with this spatial -- nobody fully gets it until you're in it. So let's try it out. They're going to sell whatever it is, 0.5 million of these, very, very quickly. And then they're going to come out with the 2.0 version. It's going to be a little smaller, a little cooler, a little cheaper, and all of a sudden, you're going to have, instead of 0.5 million, you're going to have 5 million of those sold. And then it's going to be, oh, let's come out with another version, the 3.0, and on and on and on. And the whole way, ARway, which let's be clear, our market cap is like CAD 6 million. Think about that. CAD 6 million. So let's stack it up. You got the most valuable multitrillion-dollar public company coming out with the latest and greatest technological device, advanced -- most advanced device on the planet. ARway is part of that ecosystem. We've been invited to Cupertino to their developer section that they had. And so we're going to keep growing with that ecosystem. It still works. By the way, even if the glasses didn't come out, our business still is going to explode, because of the phone. It doesn't matter if you have the glasses or -- I mean, obviously, it's a much better experience to have hands-free. But the point is, is that our tech works with the phone, it just works 100x better with the glasses. And everybody that's looking at history, is that you have to look at the adoption rate. So in 2007, if you look on the left-hand corner, you'll see the number of smartphones sold worldwide from 2007 to 2021. So 2007, 2008, 2009, the first 3 years not much growth, $122 million, $139 million, $172 million. And then, pop, it doubled. And then it almost doubled again. And then again and again and again. And so that's what's going to happen with the glasses. You're going to see some number, 0.5 million, 1 million, whatever it is, and then it's just going to start popping. And our tech -- remember, CAD 6 million market cap. For us to get to a $60 million market cap or even a $600 million market cap, all we have to do is get a couple of enterprise customers to start utilizing our tech and the tech starts to get adopted and everybody starts to realize, "Oh, this is a decade-long megatrend that I want to be a part of," and our valuation goes through the roof. So it's not about who's going to wear it and what's it worth today. It's about understanding that there's an opportunity to create generational wealth for investors that get in early on one of these megatrends. And that's the story of really this whole presentation, that we're presenting multiple opportunities for investors to get in on the ground floor of 3 different megatrends. Toggle and Nextech is really riding the AI and 3D modeling megatrend, and to a lesser degree, but still augmented reality as part of that experience as well. And e-commerce is also a big part of that as well. And then you have ARway riding the spatial computing megatrend. And this transformation and transition from your phones to your glasses is only going to accelerate it. And so that's how you create generational wealth, by getting in on the ground floor, in my opinion. And so all you have to do is go back, I don't know anyone that hasn't read, well, if you invested $1,000 in Microsoft when it first went public, and it's 50 years later, right, but that's worth like $10 million today. So yes, you got to be patient. Obviously, you could have made x number of millions along the way. But my belief is that we're at the cusp, we're at the very beginning of a decade, multi-decade long megatrend, and smart investors are going to get in. And that's really what this presentation is about.
Okay. We're coming to an end. So I thought I'd give you one last chance in a second, Evan, just to address the shareholders. But first, we should say goodbye to Hareesh. Hareesh, thanks very much. Good to see you again. And appreciate the insight into what's happening. I know we're going to talk again soon.
Yes. Thanks, Steve. Thanks, everyone.
All right. Hareesh Achi, the Head of Product Operations at Nextech3d.ai. Evan, just give you a chance just to wrap things up here, still some questions about people. Why are you no longer in the 3D model business? And I think you made that clear that that's not the case. And so I just want to give you an opportunity to talk to everyone, just to put some of these fears because there are some questions about the business side of things I think you would like to address.
Yes. So we are in the 3D modeling business. Let's be crystal clear. We are in head first. We are pioneers in the 3D modeling business. I've been at this since 2019. We are not out of the 3D modeling business. So the key takeaway here is that the business has gotten stronger. Our technology has gotten better. When we first started, we were making these 3D models, it would take us a week. Now I'm talking to our investors and saying, look, let's say it was taking us 2 hours in 2023 to make a complex 3D model of a couch. Now with our AI search engine, which we've demoed and explained and showed how it works, we're able to use that to reduce our time to, let's say, 24 minutes, which means we can produce 5 more. Now that's great for us, and we're not getting out of the business because that's a profit center for us. But I see the potential in the future for others to using our technology in such a way that we're making more money off of that business, meaning the search engine business, than we are off of making 3D models ourselves. I think that can happen, and we're going to put out that tech and see what happens, right? I mean, we're still in the early days. But we're not out of that business. We're very much in that business. We love the 3D modeling business. And we see nothing but blue sky growth and opportunities in that business. Now that's not our only business. As everybody knows, we have multiple businesses, and we're continuing to invest in all of our businesses which we see as growth opportunities. And again, our investors should take notice and take note that we are continuing to push the envelope and continuing to ask ourselves what can we do with today's AI technology. We really are a technology-first company, and we're just starting to really be able to monetize the tech, the AI tech, that we've been working on over the past few years. And so we're super excited with Apple's news, and we're going to be excited as more and more big tech companies move into the areas of growth that we're in with ARway and Nextech and Toggle.
All right. We'll leave it there. Evan, thank you so much. Good to see you again. We will get back again in the future and address some more of the technical things working with the company, okay?
Thanks, Steve.
All right. There's Evan Gappelberg, the CEO of Nextech3d.ai. And once again, thank you for joining us for another Proactive live stream, and we'll see you again.
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