Herman DeBoard, a decorated veteran of the US Air Force, created Huvr in 2019. His spark of inspiration came while watching Jake Sully, a paralyzed former Marine, use a pod to launch into another world during the original “Avatar.”
“I’m a pretty dangerous coder, so I put together a Minimum Viable Product with one of my friends,” DeBoard says. “The app we built is basically like Uber, but instead of connecting riders to drivers, we connect virtual travelers to human walkers around the world. You can log onto the app, pick the face of one of our walkers on the map, read their bio, hire them, and virtually teleport to the site. You see what they see and hear what they hear. You’re exploring the world in real-time, and you can save your videos.”