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“Someday augmented reality will become a mainstream feature of ordinary eyeglasses and sunglasses for everyday, general-purpose consumer use. But that day is many years in the future.

Reading the news, it’s easy to conclude that consumer smart glasses are on the brink of becoming available.

Apple is famously toiling away on future iGlasses. A recently published “continuation patent” (which is a patent that the company wants the Patent Office to keep examining to change the scope of the original patent) describes what Apple calls “data glasses” capable of integrating virtual content with the real world, including for StreetView-style turn-by-turn directions and other location-based applications.

The patent office recently published several new smart glasses patents for Apple. One reveals new technology Apple is working on for holographic display of objects in glasses.

Facebook’s “Reality Labs” has been working on augmented reality glasses for a few years. A patent filed this week by Facebook describes a “cartilage conduction audio system for eyewear devices” that would project sound into the ear without blocking ambient sounds.

And Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was spotted this month visiting the headquarters of Luxottica, which is a global eyeglass giant known to be interested in partnering with smart glasses makers.

These projects by Apple and Facebook won’t ship as consumer products for many years. The technology simply isn’t ready.

The article (in full here) explores why smart glasses are a non starter for consumers, citing 5 reasons:

1. They are socially unacceptable (interesting discussion on technical features and use cases in enterprise)
2. Solve business problems not consumer problems. Companies mentioned include Boeing, DHL, Airbus, medicine are all discussed.
3. Often need tethering. Many new enterprise and business products have to be tethered to a computer that’s more powerful than puny ones that can be comfortably attached to the wearer’s head.
4. Don’t have all day battery life
5. Are too expensive

The author remarks he was happy to see some of that potential as the show at the Santa Clara Convention Center was bigger than ever. Enterprises are beginning to adopt and embrace these technologies, as I saw with Volvo’s investment in AR/VR headset maker Varjo.

Takahashi met with Jim Heppelmann, CEO of PTC, the provider of the AR platform Vuforia, at AWE. He said his company’s AR revenues are about 7% of the total, and it’s growing about 90 percent a year, thanks to enterprise AR adoption for things like training and field work. That growth rate is enough to deliver 6% growth per year to the larger corporation, and it is enough to keep investing in AR.

If big companies like PTC and their big customers in the enterprise carry the torch, then we will see a market for things like Varjo’s amazing XR-1 AR technology, which the company is trying to polish so that an AR headset can be worn while driving a car. The resolution of the headset displays is much better than what is in the market today in the form of Oculus or HTC Vive VR headsets. It has two 12-megapixel cameras that can create images with a resolution of more than 4K per eye.

An enterprise might pay something like $6,000 for this kind of tech. But you can’t sell it to consumers until it costs $300. It takes a lot of spins of Moore’s Law to get to that lower cost.

A lot of companies are pivoting right now, leaving the consumer AR and VR markets and moving into enterprise, location-based entertainment, and the health, education, and industrial markets.

Once you have the graphics, you need the haptics (the sense of touch), said Nicole Lazzaro, head of XEO Design and a VR game designer.

Further comments and the full article can be read here.

There were a number of interesting results but here is one clear highlight: 70% believe that AR technology will see widespread adoption in the organization within three years.

That’s huge and an indicator that awareness of AR is maturing and that trials are proving successful, leading to full deployments.

The survey was emailed to a wide audience and received 248 responses – enough to be meaningful. These responses came from a wide range of industries including technology, mining, oil & gas, construction, manufacturing, transportation and warehousing, consulting/services and education.

Awareness of AR within enterprises is good, but could be better. Any negative impressions from the failed Google Glass consumer product have pretty much faded. According to the survey results, 25% said there was limited awareness about AR overall within leadership, while 45% say that a few members of the senior executive teams in their organizations have taken the lead and the awareness is spreading’.

Only 20% of enterprise respondents said that ‘a majority of leaders seem clear about the potential’ of AR, suggesting more education is needed.

The survey also asked about the key barriers for deploying AR. 52% said ‘unclear return on investment’, while 49% said ‘AR hardware limitations’, followed by ‘a lack of understanding where AR could be used’ (39%).

“What was a bit surprising was the relatively low percentages for privacy and safety risks (14%) and data security risks (20%),” said Wheelwright. “These expectations seem to be different in an enterprise setting compared to a consumer setting.”

So what needs to be done to improve awareness and adoption?  Wheelwright says that a lot of good information in now available at a large number of conferences devoted to AR/VR/MR, so start there.

“Trials are key to gaining awareness and developing meaningful solutions with ROI, so we try to make this as easy as possible to accomplish and always suggest setting a baseline before the trial to measure improvements,” said Wheelwright.

Another key to breaking down barriers is to leverage the existing infrastructure like hardware, connectivity, device management and security. This often means starting a trial on a smartphone or tablet to prove the benefit. In some cases where hands-free access to information is needed, the app can be migrated to a headset solution.

“This was a clear preference from our survey,” said Wheelwright, “and very much aligns with the ‘mobile-first’ strategy that Atheer recently outlined as part of its new Augmented Reality Management Platform (or ARMP).”

This is a cloud-based AR Management Platform that works with existing hardware and software in the enterprise and is designed to evolve to take advantage of new AR hardware and operating system enhancements.

Read more insights from the Atheer enterprise AR survey here.

Effective augmented reality applications can be straightforward to conceptualize, create, and implement. With modern authoring tools, developers can create immersive AR experiences. Likewise, easy-to-implement remote expert applications can have tremendous impact on maintenance and field service operations. However, these basic applications only represent a small step towards the transformational potential of industrial AR.

We can envision a future in which AR is used to orchestrate the operations of a manufacturing plant. With access to MES, EAM, and other manufacturing software applications, a connected, persona-based AR solution will contextualize and provide relevant information to the workforce on the plant floor.

Each operator’s, technician’s, and engineer’s augmented experience will be tailored to fit their role and continuously adjust to complement his or her level of knowledge.

Executing tasks will become harmonized and individuals will be able to focus their decisions on how best to achieve immediate goals. The AR market has reached a tipping point where even incremental changes in hardware technology can enable large expansions of addressable industrial applications.

The following is taken from a summary of a briefing with ARC Advisory Group, in which Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) shared several of its archetypal customer use-cases in the emerging augmented reality (AR) space.

The progress and future potential of the technology and some general AR-related trends include:

Software: AR solutions are becoming feasible to build and implement as organizations embrace digital strategies across their enterprises.

Hardware: AR hardware is maturing rapidly and by pairing with a holistic AR software platform is increasing the breadth of practical AR applications and rate of adoption.

Applications: AR adoption is finding good traction across both discrete and process industries with engineering, manufacturing, maintenance, and field service applications.

Effective augmented reality applications can be straightforward to conceptualize, create, and implement.  With modern authoring tools, developers can create immersive AR experiences.  Likewise, easy-to-implement remote expert applications can have tremendous impact on maintenance and field service operations.  However, these basic applications only represent a small step towards the transformational potential of industrial AR.

We can envision a future in which AR is used to orchestrate the operations of a manufacturing plant.  With access to MES, EAM, and other manufacturing software applications, a connected, persona-based AR solution will contextualize and provide relevant information to the workforce on the plant floor.  Each operator’s, technician’s, and engineer’s augmented experience will be tailored to fit their role and continuously adjust to complement his or her level of knowledge.  Executing tasks will become harmonized and individuals will be able to focus their decisions on how best to achieve immediate goals.

Source articles: Plant Services.com

ARC Advisory Group website.

While the industry rapidly expands and works hard to improve the AR experience, it must also overcome an important natural barrier: the way in which our eyes focus on objects.

A recent study shows that our eyes are not quite up to the task of simultaneously focusing on two separate objects—one real and one not—in close proximity to one another.

The results, published 6 May in IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, suggest that accomplishing an AR-assisted task that’s close at hand (within two meters) and requires a high level of precision may not be feasible with existing technology. This could be unwelcome news for researchers attempting to design certain AR-assisted programs.

For instance, some researchers are exploring the possibility of using AR to virtually guide surgeons who must make precise incisions, or to display a virtual axis over the surface of a bone to steer realignment surgery. But if our eyes can’t focus on both virtual and real objects simultaneously (a phenomenon called “focal rivalry”), this leaves room for error.

In the new study, Sara Condino, Vincenzo Ferrari, and their colleagues at the University of Pisa explored how focal rivalry affects people’s performance when using AR to complete precision tasks. The researchers asked 20 participants to take a “connect-the-dots” AR test, where a sequence of numbered dots was visually projected using an optical see-through (OST) device mounted on participants’ heads. With this type of AR, computer-generated content is projected onto semi-transparent displays in front of the user’s eyes, and the user can still see real-world objects beyond the screen. In these experiments, the researchers used one of the most advanced OST devices available, the Microsoft HoloLens.

Read original source article here.

With thousands of worldwide deployments of RealWear HMT-1s, RealWear is now the preferred device for Connected Worker programs by solving real-world problems in the factory or field. This is a must-attend event to get the inside scoop on commercial global deployments of industrial wearable computers.

Who will present in chronological order:

In a new study led by Jeremy Bailenson, a professor of communication in the School of Humanities and Sciences, researchers found that after people had an experience in augmented reality (AR) – simulated by wearing goggles that layer computer-generated content onto real-world environments – their interactions in their physical world changed as well, even with the AR device removed. For example, people avoided sitting on a chair they had just seen a virtual person sit on. Researchers also found that participants appeared to be influenced by the presence of a virtual person in a similar way they would be if a real person were next to them. These findings are set to publish May 14 in PLOS ONE.

To examine how AR affected the way people behaved in social situations, researchers recruited 218 participants and conducted three studies. In the first two experiments, each participant interacted with a virtual avatar named Chris who would sit on a real chair in front of them.

The first study replicated a traditional psychology finding known as social inhibition. Just as people complete easy tasks with ease and struggle with more challenging ones when they have a person watching them in the real world, the same held true when an avatar was watching study participants in augmented reality, the researchers found.

Study participants completed easy anagrams faster but performed poorly on the complex ones when avatar Chris was visible in their AR field of vision.

Another study tested whether participants would follow accepted social cues when interacting with avatar Chris. This was measured by tracking whether participants would sit on the chair that avatar Chris previously sat on.

Researchers found that all participants who wore the AR headset sat on the empty chair next to Chris instead of sitting right on the avatar. Of those participants who were asked to take off the headset before choosing their seat, 72 percent still chose to sit in the empty chair next to where Chris sat previously.

Social connections affected

“The fact that not a single one of the subjects with headsets took the seat where the avatar sat was a bit of a surprise,” Bailenson said. “These results highlight how AR content integrates with your physical space, affecting the way you interact with it. The presence of AR content also appears to linger after the goggles are taken off.”

In the third study, researchers examined how AR affects the social connection between two people who are having a conversation while one of them wears an AR headset. Researchers found that those wearing AR goggles reported feeling less socially connected to their conversation partner.

Bailenson said that additional studies, which he and his team are now working on, are needed to further examine the effects of augmented reality.

Further information on Research:

The AREA has a Research Committee specifically addressing challenges faced by the Enterprise AR industry.

Mark Miller works with lab manager Talia Weiss to run through the experiment during a testing phase. (Image credit: L.A. Cicero)

Augmented reality refers to an enhanced version of reality where live images of real-world environments overlap with superimposed computer-generated images. This offers an enhanced view of the real-world to the user having a direct effect on the person’s perception of reality in real-time.

As per a recent study by AR Insider, the number of AR-compatible smartphones is set to be 1.5 billion by the end of 2020 and shoot up to 3.4 billion by 2023. This should come as no surprise that the adoption of AR in educational apps is increasing year by year. In fact, teachers are of the opinion that EdTech solutions will ingrain augmented reality seamlessly within the confines of a classroom leading to a more holistic, multidisciplinary approach.

Augmented reality is set to a safe bet for the future with tech giants like Apple, Google, and Microsoft heavily investing in the development of this technology. What does this mean for those belonging to the education industry?

• More help with grading thereby increased time for other activities
• Immediate feedback for students
• Better research tools

Further Reading on AR in the education industry:

Entrepreneur – full source article

How new technologies like AR are impacting the online learning industry 

Augmented reality in education, learning and training 

Augmented and virtual reality in the education industry

Today’s most prominent tech giants are leaping onto the VR/AR scene, each driving forward new and upcoming product lines. Think: Microsoft’s HoloLens, Facebook’s Oculus, Amazon’s Sumerian, and Google’s Cardboard (Apple plans to release a headset by 2021).

The author consults his friend Philip Rosedale, VR AR expert, on five emerging trend predictions that will take hold, together disrupting major players and birthing new ones.  These are:

1. Transition from PC-based to standalone mobile VR devices
2. Wide field-of-view AR displays
3. Mapping of real world to enable persistent AR ‘mirror worlds’
4. 5G mobile devices reduce latency to imperceptible levels
5. Eye-tracking and facial expressions built in for full natural communication

Read the full article on here.

According to a report from the Capgemini Research Institute, 82 percent of companies currently implementing XR say the benefits are either meeting or exceeding their expectations. This is laying a positive foundation for the widespread business adoption of XR.

The topics of training, return on investment and operations are covered in the article.

These use cases are compelling and show that XR can positively impact businesses, improve operations and ultimately cut costs. Some 46 percent of companies believe the technology will become mainstream in their organization within the next three years, while a further 38 percent think it will become mainstream in their organization in the next three to five years.

The author argues that the major barriers to this adoption will be a shortage of in-house expertise and insufficient back-end infrastructures.

In terms of expertise, the AREA’s mission is to gather thought leaders in this space to help advance the adoption of enterprise AR specifically, including providing expertise across a range of services, consultancy, software and hardware via our dedicated alliance members.