David Nussbaum | Source | Founder, Inventor & CEO at PORTL Inc.

The world’s biggest electronics and tech show kicks off today in Las Vegas but calls for its cancelation has prompted the 4-day event to close one day early with surging COVID cases nationwide. Despite the metaverse being the biggest buzzword this year, health tech has taken center stage with battery-free thermometers and Portl unveiling a smaller version of their life-size hologram already used by hospitals and universities. NBC’s Jo Ling Kent reports for TODAY.

Hologram communication platform maker PORTL is looking to take communication to the next level. Founder and CEO David Nussbaum joined Cheddar to talk about the company's recent $12 million Series A funding round that will be used to bring the concept of holoportation to market. Nussbaum noted his hologram technology is just not comparable to augmented reality or virtual metaverses because the image projection is happening in real-time and in actual reality. "Well, unlike VR or AR, we're 'R.' We're real. You don't need a headset. You don't need wearables. You don't need to download anything. It's incredible," he said.

Zoom is great and all, but talking to a lot of two-dimensional humans on computer screens is hardly the future we were all dreaming of. PORTL agrees, and under the catchy slogan “if you can’t be there, beam there,” has carved out a new slice of the market, where you can holographi…