OREANDA-NEWS. March 16, 2016. AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) today announced it is helping colleges and universities create dedicated virtual reality (VR) labs as Crytek's exclusive technology partner in their VR First™ initiative. The VR First™ initiative provides colleges and universities a ready-made VR solution for developers, students and researchers. AMD will equip the labs with its new Radeon™ Pro Duo graphics cards featuring LiquidVR™ SDK, the world's fastest and most powerful VR creator platform1, capable of both creating and consuming VR content. AMD will provide its LiquidVR™ Software Developer Kit (SDK) as part of the GPUOpen initiative.

Virtual reality has the potential to revolutionize how people experience the digital world with implications for gaming, entertainment, education, medicine, journalism and numerous other fields. The ultimate goal is to equip a new generation of developers who will create amazing and compelling experiences for users worldwide. AMD and Crytek share a commitment to seeding grassroots VR development.

"We're on the cusp of an immersive computing era enabled by GPUs and game engines," said

Raja Koduri, senior vice president and chief architect, Radeon Technologies Group, AMD. "We need a new generation of developers whose educational foundation includes mastery of game engines and GPU programming. We're dedicated to nurturing that future, and see the collaboration with Crytek and the VR First initiative as a key step in realizing the goal of expanding immersive experiences outlined in our VR Ready Programs."

The new labs will be equipped with AMD Radeon™ Pro Duo graphics cards with LiquidVR™ SDK, the world's fastest VR content creator platform bridging content creation and consumption and offering an astonishing 16 teraflops of compute power. Designed to be compatible with multiple head mounted displays, including the Oculus Rift™ and HTC Vive™, AMD Radeon™ Pro Duo cards will encourage grassroots VR development around the world. The initial VR First Lab at Bah?e?ehir University in Istanbul is already up and running in January of this year.

"VR First labs will become key incubators for nurturing new talent in VR development and creating a global community well-prepared to innovate in this exciting and emerging field," said

Cevat Yerli, CEO, Crytek. "VR experiences, harnessing the power of the CRYENGINE and developed using world-class Radeon™ hardware and software, will have the potential to fundamentally transform how we interact with technology."

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