The 4th February is World Cancer Day and to honour international awareness of the disease virtual reality (VR) company Fibrum held a special charity event for the children’s oncological ward in Balashikha Central District Hospital, Russia.
World Cancer Day sees cancer communities and organizations globally unite, helping spread the word as one voice across a wider audience, hopefully motivating people around the world to take action in reducing the growing impact of cancer.
Fibrum decided to hold an event at the children’s hospital as a way of introducing the kids to virtual reality (VR), letting them experience some of the company’s content from its Desirium platform via several of its mobile compatible headsets. It was a day where the children could forget about surgeries, chemotherapies and various other procedures, and escape into virtual worlds.
It wasn’t all just about VR though, with Fibrum bringing along face-painting and balloon making activities to also keep the kids entertained.
Regarding the day the company said in a statement: “Fibrum wanted to send a bigger message of encouraging ordinary people and companies in Russia to create change and be more active in the civic engagement movement which is highly popular in Western cultures.”
Fibrum was founded in April 2014 by entrepreneur Ilya Flax, initially starting out by making robust plastic headsets similar to Google Cardboard where a phone could be quickly mounted for a simple VR experience. The company then diversified into software before focusing on its own content platform Desirium VR, which was released in the Oculus Store on 19th September 2018.
The DESIRIUM VR platform was made possible thanks to the investment of $1 million (USD), led by The FunCubator and NP Capital Funds. Currently compatible with Oculus Go and Samsung Gear VR, Desirium currently includes 15+ titles covering three intensity levels, with videogames and headset support to come. VRFocus will continue its coverage of Fibrum, reporting back with the latest updates.