A fundamental transition in the fundraising market towards AR from VR, as well as the very early-stage dynamics of mobile AR, is driving an acceleration of fundraising trends we anticipated at the start of the year.  As expected in a transitional year, overall deal volumes declined slightly in the short-term as VCs and corporates look to medium-term mobile AR and long-term smartglasses growth.

The investment dollar figures for the last 12 months and first quarter are impressive, but digging beneath the surface reveals what is really going on. As has become more expected in early-stage tech markets, mega-rounds take the lion’s share of dollars invested. In the last 12 months Magic Leap raised nearly $1 billion ($502 million in Q4 2017 and $461 million in Q1 2018), Improbable raised $502 million, Niantic raised $200 million, and Unity did another big round.

While the five largest deals took half the money, smaller companies have been quietly augmenting their coffers. The pun is intentional, as the trend at the start of the year has been for investors to favor AR across many of the 28 AR/VR investment sectors. In contrast, VR startups have found the fundraising environment more challenging.

By investment sector, AR/VR tech took one-third of investment dollars, followed by smartglasses at a similar scale. AR/VR games, navigation, medical, social, photo/video and peripherals were also significant. Smaller sectors by funds raised were AR/VR lifestyle, location-based, entertainment, enterprise, VR headset, education, advertising/marketing, music, solutions/services, health/fitness, business, video, utilities, news, ecommerce, travel/transport, art/design and sports.

In augmented reality technology, both virtual reality and the real world are combined together thus enriching the real world with digital information. Owing to its increased benefits augmented reality is being adopted in various sectors such as manufacturing, healthcare, education, retail, etc. Use of augmented reality technology helps in saving a lot of time and increases the product and work quality.

Although, there are several benefits offered by augmented reality technology there are some factors that are limiting the market growth. The cost of the software and devices that are used in this technology are high which restricts its implementation by the small and the medium enterprises. Insufficient knowledge about the technology limits its adoption.

Browse the full “AR in Enterprise Market by Component (Hardware and Software); by Display Device (Head-Mounted Display, Smart Glass, and Head-up Display); by Enterprise Size (SME’s and Large Enterprise); by Application (Automotive, Aerospace and Defense, Medical, Gaming, and Retail)- Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 2025”. Market report link.

Research analysts concluded that, even though the automotive sector contributed the major market share but an increasing adoption of the technology will be seen in the retail sector. Big brands have already adopted the AR solutions. By using AR solutions the retailers are impressing their customers with dynamic 3D images while remaining in reality. Owing to which the customers are able to see their products and engage with it in a new way.

The global AR in enterprise market is segmented on the basis of the component, display device, enterprise size, application, and the geographical regions.

Augmented reality will now help truck drivers, warehouse workers, and management keep track of products from the second they leave the factory until the moment they arrive at your door.

Using sensors on packaging, company managers will be able to perform advanced analysis of how a company’s products are doing. In real-time, a factory can increase or decrease production based on that day’s sales at thousands of retail locations. Data scientists working on the digital supply chain can generate new insights from their products regardless of whether the shipment is sitting in the back of a delivery truck or on a distributor’s warehouse shelf. If sales are as robust as forecast, manufacturers can cut losses by making fewer products and redistributing items to where the demand is.

With over one billion AR-enabled smartphones and tablets already in use, companies don’t have to wait for low-cost augmented reality glasses to start reaping the benefits of augmented reality.

The 5 ways in which AR is transforming the supply chain into a nimble tool for global distribution are listed below and explored in detail in the full article:

1) Pick-and-Pack Services

2) Collaborative Robotics

3) Maintenance

4) Last Mile Delivery

5) Procurement

Big data drives the decision making behind the world’s distribution of products throughout the supply chain. Augmented reality is now poised to exponentially increase the speed at which data can be analyzed and acted on. The insights augmented reality bring to the supply chain can be used to power the next generation of the supply chain, which will feature autonomous vehicles and delivery drones.

The author of the article, Jay Samit is independent vice chairman of Deloitte’s Digital Reality practice and author of the bestselling book “Disrupt You!”

Some of the biggest medical advances of the last few decades have been in diagnostic imaging—ultrasonogaphy, mammography, computerized tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and so on. The same forces that have propelled technology developments elsewhere—tiny cameras, smaller and faster processors, and real-time data streaming—have revolutionized how doctors use imaging in performing procedures. Almost every surgery involves some sort of a scan prior to incision. Even in emergencies, surgeons have ultrasound or CT to help guide the procedure. Imaging can now be performed in real time at the point-of-care during procedures, both big and small.

Yet, while imaging has radically evolved, how images are displayed is basically the same as it was in 1950. Visual data are always shown on a 2D flat screen, on displays that force health care providers to look away from the patient, and even away from their own hands while operating. Further, the images are not displayed from the perspective of the viewer, but rather from that of the imaging device: doctors have to use skill and imagination to understand and mentally project the images into the patient while they are doing procedures. Finally, different types of visual data are displayed separately, so doctors have to direct additional attention to mentally fusing multiple image types, such as angiography and CT, into a coherent representation of the patient. Acquiring this skill takes years of training.

Augmented reality (AR), a set of technologies that superimpose digital information on the physical world, has the potential to change all of this. In our research at the Maryland Blended Reality Center’s “Augmentarium,” we are prototyping AR applications in medicine, as are teams at Stanford, Duke and Johns Hopkins. In envisioned application, a surgeon using an AR headset such as Microsoft’s HoloLens would be able to see digital images and other data directly overlaid on her field of view. In such a scenario, the headset might display a hovering echocardiogram with vital signs and data on the characteristics of the patient’s aneurysm directly above the surgical field. The surgeon needn’t look away from the patient to multiple different displays to gather and interpret this information.

AR’s potential ability to concurrently display imaging data and other patient information could save lives and decrease medical errors. This is especially true for procedures done outside an operating room. The OR may be the safest place in the hospital, where one patient has an entire team of 4 to 8 dedicated doctors and nurses. Because everyone has pre-operative imaging, the procedures are generally well-planned. Anesthesiologists monitor the patient’s physiology and administer pain-controlling and life-saving medications. Surgical nurses make sure all of the necessary equipment is immediately available. Surgeons can be completely immersed in the operative task. But time in the room is extremely costly, and ORs are solidly booked with elective cases. Elective operations are an essential source of revenue for all hospitals, so there is incredible pressure to keep ORs full and flowing. Small, emergent procedures do not easily fit into this reality. As a result, many of these procedures are done outside the OR in intensive care units and emergency departments. It’s during these “bedside procedures” that patients may be most at risk and where AR could provide some of the greatest benefit.

The full article can be read here.

The Research Priority Areas 2018–2023 document which was recently published states new areas of study that will be key for investment over the time period assessed. The review was conducted as part of the Irish Government’s Innovation 2020 research and development strategy; it updates the areas that were first prioritised in the introduction of research prioritisation in 2012.

The aim of this initiative was to map government funding around areas of research most likely to provide large economic revenue. However, this policy was controversial when first introduced and still now among researchers who felt their disciplines were sidelined due to lack of commercial potential.

Key updates to the document include:

• The ‘Energy’ area has been renamed to ‘Energy, Climate Action and Sustainability’
• Priority areas for the above are now ‘Decarbonising the Energy System; and Sustainable Living’
• In the area of ICT, robotics, artificial intelligence (including machine learning), AR and VR have all been added
• The ‘Health’ area has been renamed to ‘Well-Being’
• The ‘Sustainable Food Production and Processing’ area has been broadened to include the need for climate smart and environmentally sustainable food systems
• The manufacturing area has been renamed to ‘Advanced and Smart Manufacturing’
• The ‘Processing Technologies and Novel Materials’ has been renamed ‘Manufacturing and Novel Materials’

Professor Orla Feely, Vice-President for Research, Innovation and Impact at UCD, is in support of the updates, as she claims that they reflect major global opportunities for Ireland, and place importance on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. However, she is quoted to have aired concerns about reaching the national R&D intensity ambition of 2.5% of GNP by 2020.

The leading distributor of medical supplies, Medtree, has listed tech trends in medicine, and what they could lead to in future:

• Drones – their delivery of medical supplies is saving lives in countries with lack of roads, medicine, and poor access to hospitals. Zipline, pioneer of the first national drone delivery network in Rwanda, has made almost 1000 drops of blood in life-or-death situations.
• Augmented Reality – Touch Surgery, one of the latest pioneers of the AR trend, are developing Go Surgery, which provides medical experts with step-by-step guides to certain surgery procedures, projected holographically onto a screen. It can be used to train medics on detailed aspects of surgery.
• Clinical Skills App – designed by Medtree, this free programme allows clinicians to record skills and clinical interventions. The app enables easy documentation of airway interventions, wound management, drug administration, etc.
• MelaFind – this is a non-invasive device that uses light to evaluate skin lesions up to 2.55m below the skin, and was a pioneer for this type of research. The QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute conducted the world’s largest skin cancer study in order to create a highly accurate online test to predict your likelihood of developing the disease, made available earlier this month.
• Partnerships – Google partnered with Calico (a unit made to tackle the challenge of ageing and disease associated with this) in 2013. Two years later, the organisations merged to try ‘stop’ the ageing process; an experimental drug compound, P7C3, has been developed as a result, with the potential to be used to treat Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative diseases.
• 3D Printing – this market is expected to expand by 17.5% between 2017 and 2025, being mainly driven by industry including healthcare. The technology can be used for implants, instrumentation, and external prostheses. Tissue engineering is currently under development, therefore is the newest practice for 3D printing.
• Virtual Reality Games – the first platform for healthcare is AppliedVR, which offers patients an escape from chronic pain stress and surgical recovery. Guided Relaxation, the first product created by Cedars-Sini Medical Centre’s partnership with medical academics and psychologists, allows patients to relax with mindfulness exercises.
• Healthcare Robots – P&S Market Research have predicted that the global personal robot market will reach $34.1 billion by 2022. An in-home healthcare robot has been developed by Pillo Health and Orbita, which combines AI and voice technology, for hope of release in Q4 of this year to reduce inefficiencies in healthcare.
• Digital Stethoscopes – these offer features such as audio recording and sound amplification to improve accuracy of diagnosis. Eko Devices have produces the DUO, a combined electronic stethoscope and EKG that allows insights into cardiac function by working in conjunction with the mobile app.

Designed for enterprise customers, Toshiba’s new dynaEdgeTM AR Smart Glasses packages together the company’s new dynaEdge AR100 Head Mounted Display (HMD) with its dynaEdge DE-100 Mobile Mini PC for a completely wearable PC system maximizing mobility, productivity and security without compromising flexibility.

Russian IT startups are working extensively in the area of Augmented Reality, but although interest in the technology is growing in major sectors of the economy, there is still a long way to go before it is adopted on a wide scale.

Sectors such as defence, railways and automotive have shown interest in AR, but it is by no means a done deal for most organisations.

“It is no longer hype, but real interest,” said Sergey Polinenko, General DIrector Itorum, a company resident at the innovation hub Skolkovo outside Moscow.

However, Russian companies working in AR still face various challenges, especially when it comes to actually selling the technology to customers.

There is a large gap between companies expressing an interest and actually placing an order, said Polinenko. “Most enterprises in Russia are not prepared to take a risk – they wait until a solution becomes adopted in the West,” he said.

Itorum’s main product is AR glasses, which are used in quality control and servicing equipment at industrial enterprises. Technicians wearing AR glasses can take advantage of remote consultations with experts located elsewhere in the world, whose advice and suggestions can be seen on the glasses.

Itorum also provides services using AR glasses for training and education and to help industrial personnel control operations.

Meanwhile, Fibrum, another Russian startup that specialises in AR applications, is gaining customers in the exhibitions sector.  Nikita Vyugin, Marketing Director at Fibrum, said the biggest difficulty is often customers’ insufficient understanding of the difference between VR AR and mixed reality.

“Although AR and VR solutions are relatively widespread, the industry is still quite young and, although promising, many people still see it as a curiosity,” he said.

More can be read in the full Computer Weekly article.

From BrainXChange: “Determining ROI a key challenge faced by enterprises today in the still-early days of the technology, for it’s not always a simple matter of numbers and percentages.  At BrainXChange’s EWTS events, real end users shared first-hand experiences of and outside-the-box thinking about gauging the ROI of wearables in your business.

When we talk about ROI, we usually talk in terms of concrete numbers. But what we heard from a number of enterprise users is that it’s often not easy to pin down numbers with wearable technology; sometimes it’s more practical – even necessary – to qualify than to quantify the success of these devices in your organization.

Peter Godino, Hershey Company: “There is always an ROI when you’re improving the way you do something [but] there are some things I don’t like to put KPIs to. I know there’s an enhancement. Sometimes it’s improving the quality of life for your engineering team or the people on the floor. A lot of metrics cannot be expressed as a dollar return, but we’ve seen a lot of benefits from wearable technology. Line uptime will be one of the big outcomes, though we cannot claim to have seen a reduction in downtime at this time; but we’re pretty sure we’ll have that information in the future.”

While you might view that as sort of a gamble – banking on the hope that one day there will be numerical data to support the adoption of wearables in enterprise – improving employees’ quality of life is no minor benefit:

Kristi Montgomery, Kenco Logistics: “Improving the quality of life for those end users (warehouse workers) is hard to quantify from a dollar perspective…Employee satisfaction and engagement–if we can improve that [then] we feel like we’ve accomplished something even if there’s no hard dollar amount we can account for.”

Peter also spoke to the idea that sometimes you just know there’s an enhancement:

Dawn Bridges, Jacobs Engineering: “A wearable that recognizes a barcode is an efficiency.” Replacing hand-held barcode scanners with something wearable that frees up workers’ hands is a clear efficiency, supported by sheer logic if not by a percentage.

George Bowser of DHL gave two sides to the ROI coin: There’s measuring the impact of wearables on productivity and accuracy; and then there are less calculable, even emotional, indicators like ergonomics, impact on workers themselves, and user acceptance. And sometimes it might be necessary to weigh some metrics against others: If it’s not possible to (accurately) calculate an increase in productivity over the short lifespan of a pilot program; talking with users – even handing out questionnaires as DHL does – might reveal other, more immediately observable improvements such as less physical strain or awkwardness for workers using smart glasses to scan items instead of a handheld scanner.”

Other case studies and quotes from the full article can be read here.

A report released by ABI Research shows that the AR market is still undergoing significant expansion into new areas in consumer and enterprise sectors.

ABI Research is predicting that binocular device types such as smartglasses will undergo continued increases in demand, especially with regards to manufacturing and enterprise applications from companies such as Vuzix and Avegant.

The report forecasts that there will be 32.7 million total smart glasses shipments in 2022, growing from 225 thousand in 2017. The development of the technology to provide smaller and more lightweight form-factor smartglasses, with higher resolution displays will drive continued demand.

“The past few years have allowed augmented reality to take root in the enterprise with compelling and unique use cases, including remote expertise and hands-free instruction,” says Eric Abbruzzese, Principal Analyst for ABI Research. “As the market matures, there will be a need for greater capability in these AR devices, with displays powering much of the change. Given the growing consumer market interest, the similarities and differences between display types in AR will be increasingly important.”

“As the AR demand grows in enterprise and begins in the consumer market, the requirements for smart glasses shift,” continues Abbruzzese. “Generally, an increased desire for higher-performing devices will push the market toward better displays in every category, with some use cases targeting specific needs. Consumer fitness devices will require small form factors and high brightness suitable for outdoor usage. AR media and entertainment growth with necessitate binocular, 3D capable devices with high resolution. Devices used in environments with high safety requirements will favor safety certified devices with highly transparent displays. Across the board, as knowledge and comfort with the potential of AR grow, so does the expectation for the devices, and with that expectation the requirements for devices grow too.”