You know, I have learnt not to get to deep into arguing on the net, as it usually leads to nowhere, but I don't want to let this one pass.
Let me tell you something, if a reputable source (such as WSJ, FT, NYT, Engadget, etc.) leaks something, they are usually telling the whole story. So when Engadget pretty much accurately leaked every single detail about Gear VR through multiple articles, it means the information they provided was mostly accurate.
And I would say the following quote:
"the urgency is said to be a measure of beating Facebook's Oculus Rift and Sony's Project Morpheus to market." from Engadget is straight forward and it doesn't mean the competitors are some non-existent mobile VR products like you implied above.
http://www.engadget.com/2014/05/22/samsung-vr-headset/
I would still give Samsung the benefit of the doubt, of course, but we are talking about a company in which they feel quite insecure and release a product the moment there's a rumor that some big company is about to enter that area. The obvious example is the SmartWatch rumor by Apple and how they created a rushed product to beat them to the market, and since then they have reiterated on SmartWatches in a clueless manner a few times already, in a matter of a single year only!
Of course, the more interesting example of beating others to the competition was their Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 after it was rumored that Apple was working on one with a pen support. Look at this Note 12.2 commercial and tell me this is not an insecure company here just trying to cash in the VR hype.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f16D0RSbzUw
Just to be clear, in my previous post, I only said I can provide example of the fact that Samsung is notorious of having an R&D division that hinges on new potentially big products from others in order to beat others to the competition and take the position of a ‘market pioneer and innovators’. And I guess you just need a bit of conjecture to realize that the Engadget comment is more than likely true, and you calling me wrong is the only baseless argument here.
Oh well, but I am sure potentially getting an exclusive right to purchase Samsung’s AMOLED panel for VR in order to hamper competition, and a whole 12 cents less per panel for Oculus VR is more than worth it for them to go against what they said they were standing for.
