LOS ANGELES: Looking for a new way to communicate during the pandemic? A Los Angeles company has created phone booth-sized machines to beam live holograms into your living room. The device made by PORTL Inc. lets users talk in real time with a life-sized hologram of another person.
The machines also can be equipped with technology to enable interaction with recorded holograms of historical figures or relatives who have died.
Each PORTL device is seven feet (2.1m) tall, five feet (1.5m) wide and two feet (0.6m) deep, and can be plugged into a standard wall outlet. Anyone with a camera and a white background can send a hologram to the machine in what Chief Executive David Nussbaum calls “holoportation.”
“We say if you can’t be there, you can beam there,” said Nussbaum, who previously worked at a company that developed a hologram of Ronald Reagan for the former president’s library and digitally resurrected rapper Tupac Shakur.
“We are able to connect military families that haven’t seen each other in months, people from opposite coasts,” or anyone who is social distancing to fight the coronavirus, Nussbaum said. Prices for the machine start at $60,000, a cost that Nussbaum expects will drop over the next three to five years. The company also plans a smaller tabletop device with a lower price tag early next year.
The devices can be equipped with artificial intelligence technology from Los Angeles-based company StoryFile to produce hologram recordings that can be archived.
Adding that to the current device brings the cost to at least $85,000. The companies are promoting to museums, which could let visitors question a hologram of a historical figure, and to families to record information for future generations.
People can feel like they are having a conversation with a recorded hologram, said StoryFile Chief Executive Heather Smith.
“(You) feel their presence, see their body language, see all their non-verbal cues,” she said. “You feel like you’ve actually talked to that individual even though they were not there.”
‘If you can’t be there, you can beam there’ — company offers at-home hologram machines
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‘If you can’t be there, you can beam there’ — company offers at-home hologram machines
- The devices can be equipped with artificial intelligence technology from Los Angeles-based company StoryFile to produce hologram recordings that can be archived
Closing Bell: Saudi main index slips to close at 11,228
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul All Share Index slipped on Sunday, lost 23.17 points, or 0.21 percent, to close at 11,228.64.
The total trading turnover of the benchmark index was SR2.99 billion ($797 million), as 170 of the stocks advanced and 82 retreated.
On the other hand, the Kingdom’s parallel market Nomu gained 449.38 points, or 1.90 percent, to close at 24,093.12. This comes as 43 of the stocks advanced while 27 retreated.
The MSCI Tadawul Index lost 6.07 points, or 0.40 percent, to close at 1,511.36.
The best-performing stock of the day was Obeikan Glass Co., whose share price surged 7.54 percent to SR27.66.
Other top performers included Alamar Foods Co., whose share price rose 6.80 percent to SR47.10, as well as Saudi Kayan Petrochemical Co., whose share price climbed 6.79 percent to SR5.66.
Saudi Investment Bank recorded the steepest drop, falling 3.21 percent to SR13.56.
Jahez International Co. for Information System Technology also saw its share price fall 3.15 percent to SR13.55.
Rabigh Refining and Petrochemical Co. declined 2.78 percent to SR7.34.
On the announcements front, Tanmiah Food Co. reported its annual financial results for the period ending Dec. 31. According to a Tadawul statement, the company recorded a net loss of SR18.8 million, compared with a net profit of SR95.8 million a year earlier.
The net loss was mainly due to ongoing market challenges that resulted in continued pricing pressures in fresh poultry, inflationary cost pressures, higher financing expenses, and depreciation and ramp-up costs from new facilities, partially offset by increased production volumes and cost-optimization initiatives.
Tanmiah Food Co. ended the session at SR58.20, up 3.72 percent.
United International Holding Co., also known as Tas’heel, announced its annual financial results for the period ending Dec. 31. A bourse filing showed the company recorded a net profit of SR273.64 million in 2025, up 23.05 percent from 2024, primarily driven by a 23.4 percent rise in revenues. The revenue growth helped lift gross profit by 23.7 percent.
Tas’heel ended the session at SR146.80, down 0.28 percent.
