SPRITE+ at Immersive Tech Week 2026
- 19 hours ago
- 3 min read
Emma Barrett, University of Manchester and SPRITE+ lead for the XRCET-TIPSS Deep Dive
Last month I attended Immersive Tech Week in Rotterdam. It was the first time I had attended this conference, and compared to the United XR Europe (AWE) conference last December, this one was smaller, less glitzy, less hype-y, and less full of pushy industry representatives advocating for weak state regulation of XR tech...
The mood was positive but cautious. Several keynotes basically said the same thing: it's tough out there for the XR industry right now. However, although the age of 'Metaverse' hype is over and the age of AI hype is at its peak, XR is not dead, just maturing. Of course, discussions about AI pervaded everything, but other areas of convergence were also highlighted: digital twins, robotics, haptic interfaces, drones...
Several panel discussions focused on what it actually takes to deploy, maintain and govern XR systems in real-world settings, inevitably raising TIPSS questions. Industry and public sector speakers highlighted the need for real evidence of value, workable deployment models, and a clear understanding of the human, organisational and technical issues involved. This came through particularly clearly in discussions of XR in the public sector, where deployment cannot succeed without answering critical questions about who operates the system, who maintains the content, who trains users, how data is protected, how IT security is managed, how accessibility is built in, and how the system integrates with existing organisational processes.
TIPSS issues associated with XR generally, and AI-enabled XR specifically, came up in multiple sessions. In one panel, Thomas Dexmer, from HTC Vive, described security and trust as central to HTC's approach to AI / AR glasses. This includes user choice over third-party data sharing, encrypted local storage, restrictions on using user data for model training, and hardware-based recording indicators. At the same time, several speakers highlighted the trade-offs required in consumer- and enterprise-facing AI-enabled XR systems. AIthough they may promise convenience, personalisation and contextual awareness, but these benefits can depend on collecting or inferring sensitive data about users, spaces, and behaviours. Speakers repeatedly returned to questions of user agency, transparency, bystander privacy, and the need to understand regulatory developments beyond the US, particularly in Europe.
The fragmentation of standards and governance approaches was a feature of several contributions. Mattieu Worm from the Virtual Worlds Association claimed they had found more than 1,300 standards relevant to XR, and warned against the temptation to “invent new ones". The challenge, he argued, lies less in the content of standards than in identifying, coordinating, interpreting, and applying the most relevant ones across a rapidly evolving ecosystem. In this context, several speakers highlighted the benefits of open standards (such as OpenXR and WebXR) in promoting interoperability, coherent governance, and good practice.
Oliver Edis, who maintains and develops ReactVision, a full stack open source tool for XR app development argued that open-source approaches are essential for improving access to XR developer tools and training. He noted that mainstream XR developer tools emerged from - and tend to assume familiarity with - 2D game engines. This creates a high barrier to entry, and risks spatial computing being disproportionately shaped by gaming cultures, purely commercial priorities, and those with the resources to keep up. His philosophy is that XR should have “the widest door, not the highest ceiling”: tools should meet all developers where they are. Tooling shapes who participates in building XR, whose needs are prioritised, and which values are embedded in systems - highlighting, once again, the importance of taking a systemic approach to the development and governance of XR technologies.