Fujifilm rumbles into games space

Photo expert Fujifilm wants to shake up the video games market.

The Japanese giant has told MCV it hopes the likes of Nintendo and Sony will use its new technology that can ‘transmit the ‘sense of touch’ in future versions of 3DS and Vita.

The firm’s technology division, Fuji Xerox, has hired go-between firm NineSigma to help it find partners in the videogames industry.The new tech uses a movement sensor that claims to ‘reproduce the sensations of touching by physical movement’.

In other words, it can add varying degrees of force feedback to handheld consoles depending on the player’s movement.

It can also be used as a more compact type of vibrating technology for mobile phones, or as a piece of integrated force feedback kit for smaller games controllers and joysticks.

We want to find potential partners to expand Fuji Xerox’s business together,” NineSigma’s vice president and director Tatsuya Hoshino told MCV. Since this tech is small, it can be installed into portable devices.Fuji Xerox doesn’t have any partner in the games industry at the moment, so we are actively contacting game device makers.”

The piece of rumble technology would mark Fuji’s entry into the games industry.

Fujifilm was founded in 1934 as a photographic film producer. Today it works in the medical, life science and office equipment sectors, too. It employs over 35,000 staff worldwide and has a share capital of around 40bn (330m).