SAN JOSE, CA -- (Marketwired) -- Apr 05, 2016 -- GPU Technology Conference -- Bringing to life the first steps of visiting our neighboring planet, Mars 2030, an interactive virtual reality experience, debuted today at the GPU Technology Conference.

Created by NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) and FUSION Media, Mars 2030 transports people in VR to the Red Planet, where they are immersed in the simulated life of one of the first arriving NASA astronauts. They can explore deep space, live in a realistic Martian habitat, drive across the planet's surface and drill into the surface of its ancient lake beds.

Speaking at the GTC opening keynote, NVIDIA CEO and co-founder Jen-Hsun Huang introduced the experience to personal computing pioneer Steve "Woz" Wozniak over a video link powered by Cisco TelePresence. Wearing a VR headset, Woz, an advocate of Mars travel, said, "Oh my gosh, this is going to be incredible for whoever actually gets to travel to Mars!"

Mars 2030 was developed using scientifically accurate satellite imagery and data gathered in years of exploration missions. It boasts a level of graphics fidelity that is only possible with NVIDIA® VRWorks™ technologies.

"One in a billion people alive today will get to visit Mars, so this is for the rest of us," said Zvi Greenstein, general manager of the GeForce business unit at NVIDIA. "Mars 2030 is being created as a true to life experience, while aiming for the highest visual fidelity possible in VR today, something only NVIDIA technology can deliver."

NASA is providing technical expertise to FUSION through a Space Act Agreement to make the first Mars surface VR experience based on actual operational and hardware concepts that the agency is currently studying. Mars 2030 incorporates VRWorks' Multi-Res Shading, which renders each part of an image to best suit the pixel density required by a headset. It also includes VR SLI, which can assign multiple GPUs to a specific eye to accelerate stereo rendering.

"As a part of FUSION's commitment to innovative storytelling, we are always looking for unique ways to take our audience to interesting places," said Julian Reyes, lead VR producer at FUSION. "We are thrilled that NVIDIA's latest technologies, combined with what NASA has planned for the next frontier of space exploration, will allow us to push visual boundaries, convincing users that they are 141 million miles away from home on the surface of Mars."

GTC attendees can experience the first mission in Mars 2030, an exploration of an enormous Martian lava tube, from April 4-7 in the San Jose Convention Center.

Expected to be commercially available in the fall, Mars 2030 is optimized for NVIDIA® GeForce® and Quadro® GPUs to give the environment an unparalleled level of authenticity.

More details on Mars 2030 are available at http://www.geforce.com/mars2030.

Keep Current on NVIDIA
Subscribe to the NVIDIA blog, follow us on Facebook, Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram, and view NVIDIA videos on YouTube and images on Flickr.

About NVIDIA
NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) is a computer technology company that has pioneered GPU-accelerated computing. It targets the world's the most demanding users -- gamers, designers and scientists -- with products, services and software that power amazing experiences in virtual reality, artificial intelligence, professional visualization and autonomous cars. More information at http://nvidianews.nvidia.com/.

Certain statements in this press release including, but not limited to, statements as to the impact, performance, benefits and availability of VRWorks are forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause results to be materially different than expectations. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include: global economic conditions; our reliance on third parties to manufacture, assemble, package and test our products; the impact of technological development and competition; development of new products and technologies or enhancements to our existing product and technologies; market acceptance of our products or our partners' products; design, manufacturing or software defects; changes in consumer preferences or demands; changes in industry standards and interfaces; unexpected loss of performance of our products or technologies when integrated into systems; as well as other factors detailed from time to time in the reports NVIDIA files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, including its Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2016. Copies of reports filed with the SEC are posted on the company's website and are available from NVIDIA without charge. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and speak only as of the date hereof, and, except as required by law, NVIDIA disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances.

© 2016 NVIDIA Corporation. All rights reserved. NVIDIA, the NVIDIA logo, GeForce, Quadro and VRWorks are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation in the U.S. and other countries. Other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated. Features, pricing, availability and specifications are subject to change without notice.

For further information, contact:
Brian Burke
Senior PR Manager
NVIDIA Corporation
(512) 401-4385

bburke@nvidia.com 

---