Earlier this week, the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate announced ten startup organisations to participate in EMERGE 2016: Wearable Technology, which will connect strategic partners through a common aim for development and research. The link to the program can be found here.

The program is centred around wearable tech used especially by first responders; they require devices such as advance sensors, integrated voice, embedded data communications, and body-worn electronics, and wearables can integrate multiple technologies. The program will also allow the startups access to feed back from first responders, industry partners, and educational resources for business development from mentors.

Dr. Reginald Brothers, the Under Secretary for Science and Technology, is quoted to have said that the startup selection is essential for innovating, and that entrepreneurs are major players in inventing solutions for integrating tech into existing equipment.

Listed below are the ten selected startups, the first two of which are AREA members. The AREA would like to wish them all the best in the program:

• Augmate
• Six15 Technologies
• CommandWear Systems
• HAAS Alert
• Human Systems Integration
• Lumenus
• LuminAID
• Pear Sports
• Vault RMS
• Visual Semantics

A recent post on Appcessories cites a list of the top nine Augmented Reality headsets from 2016 so far. Please note that The AREA is not promoting the following AR devices, however readers may be interested in the list to see some of the major players in this industry, many of whom also sell AR headsets to an enterprise market.

• Microsoft Hololens: these smart glasses use holograms to augment reality by placing a virtual view over your real life surroundings. It is not yet available for consumers, due to currently being a developer edition.
• Magic Leap: this is a startup developing AR glasses, with realistic graphics. It is said to potentially replace screened devices in future.
• Solos AR glasses: these were specially developed for cyclists, as they display real time data such as heart rate, distance, speed, and power zones. The display is only 4mm, allowing the cyclist to maintain a clear view of the road.
• Vuzix M300: these smart glasses run on Android, although they can also connect to iOS phones, and are loaded with features such as Wi-Fi, GPS, and Bluetooth.
• CastAR: these smart glasses are made for gaming in particular, and work by projecting virtual images onto the surroundings of the wearer. They work with table top surfaces and also allow multiplayer modes.
• Meta AR: these glasses use holograms that can be manipulated like physical objects, and can also run apps from Windows and Mac. They are designed for architects and engineers to use professionally.
• Laster SeeThru: these smart glasses project real time data onto the display and involve head movement tracking sensors for accurate AR.
• Epson Moverio BT-300: these eyeglasses are more visually appealing and lighter than the previous BT-200 model, and project virtual images in vibrant color. They are generally marketed at professionals, though consumers aren’t excluded from buying them.
• Recon Jet Smart Glasses: these glasses were also designed for cyclists, and include sensors such as a thermometer, accelerometer, altimeter, and GPS.

The article concludes by assessing Augmented Reality glasses, pointing out its great potential, but also that most of the products mentioned contain flaws.

A recent post on itpro.co.uk has emphasised the impact of wearables within businesses of all shapes and sizes. With 70 million wearable devices shipped worldwide last year, and that statistic set to grow to 237 million by 2020, wearables are not only being enjoyed by consumers, but are also providing innovation within a range of businesses. Cloud company Rackspace reported that employees using wearables saw an 8.5% increase in productivity and a 3.5% rise in job satisfaction.

• Head of Crown Workplace Relocations, Shaun Baker, predicts that businesses will continue to bring wearable tech into their operations, and says that we are heading into an era of workplace technology. Baker speaks of Cicret, a French start-up company working with wristbands that enable users to project content onto their arms; “the concept is to do exactly what you do with a tablet- but on your skin…it’s one to look out for”.
• Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality are contributing more wearables. Revolutionizing the wearable sector, AR and VR are being used in the form of headsets launched by companies such as Samsung, Microsoft and Oculus. Georgina Wilczek, VR & AR World’s Conference Manager, says that, “augmented reality technology can now fulfil many essential business needs across a vast range of sectors”.
• Data obtained from wearables can be hugely valuable to businesses, as firms can use such data in order to learn more about their customers and offer them personalised experiences.
• “Wearables such as smart watches, glasses and clothing, are transforming the way businesses communicate, as well as helping to boost productivity, streamline businesses processes and maximise efficiencies,” says Matt Hunt, CEO of Apadmi Enterprise. Hunt explains how wearables are already creating benefits in the workplace.

The following summary relates to a blog item that appeared on AREA Member APX Labs’ website this week. A greater number of organizations, particularly those with a large hands-on workforce, are making use of augmented reality and smart glasses for ways to improve productivity, quality and operational efficiency. Now, configuration and management of smart glasses deployment is set to improve.

A partnership between APX and Airwatch, the largest global enterprise mobility management provider, was set up to ease the IT deployment of smart glasses. Last week at the Connect 2016 conference, Airwatch officially announced it will be building new features in collaboration with several hardware vendors, including Intel and VUZIX Corp, to support smart glasses into their VMware Airwatch enterprise mobility management platform.

APX have extended Airwatch’s management capabilities into their Skylight platform, which powers assisted reality applications on smart glasses. According to APX, the result will be the first fully-integrated enterprise mobility management solution for smart glasses available on the market.

The main drivers for this were APX customer requests from the likes of Boeing, who require methods of transition from pilot implementations to production-level deployment.

Being able to reduce overheads on configurations is an important factor in the industry as a whole. The new roll out will provide benefits in the form of seamless management of smart glasses, compliance with enterprise security policies, and configuration for specific users under the same device management console.

APX believes that this could be the start of making enterprise smart glass deployment more mainstream in the industry as a whole.

Enterprise Augmented Reality revenues are set to reach US$5.7 billion by the year 2021, as stated in an article on itwire.com. Analytical specialists Juniper Research have declared that consumer AR apps “will remain below that of the enterprise AR sector” right through until 2021. This research found that improvements in field of vision latency on HMDs has fuelled the growing interest in enterprise AR technologies. Future releases of HMDs, including that of Microsoft HoloLens, are also tipped to push AR revenues in the enterprise sector, with businesses choosing Head Mounted Displays over tablets and smartphones.

Juniper’s new study reports that app prices in the enterprise AR sector will be higher due to the bespoke nature of the content, and the association of names such as Hyperloop and Siemens. The result of higher content pricing and hardware will see slow adoption of the technology over the next two years, with enterprise AR revenues set to remain on smartphone and tablet devices for the time being. Enterprise focus from manufacturers such as Microsoft and Vuzix, however, allows for a massive revenue opportunity for content developers on HMDs from the year 2020.

Juniper also comments that although “the smartphone will give an immediate audience and distribution channel”, a constant focus on innovation will be required in order to keep consumers engaged.

A press release on BusinessWire reported on the additional release of the “Global Smart Glass and Window Market – By Technology, Application, and Geography” report, by Research and Markets. In 2014, the market was valued at $2.3 billion, and is forecast to be worth over $5.80 billion by 2020. It will increase by a CAGR of 15.7% during this period.

Key topics covered in the report include:

• Market overview
• Market segmentation, forecast, and trends: by technology, application, and geography
• Industry structure
• Future proposals
• Company profiles
• Vendor market share analysis
• Market dynamics
Companies mentioned in the report include:
• Glass Apps
• Research Frontiers, Inc
• Sage Electrochromics
• Scienstry Inc.
• Gentex Corporation
• Asahi Glass Co., Ltd.
The article also states that the market is mainly fuelled by an increased demand for global energy, as smart glasses will reduce costs for heating and lighting, etc. Development of technology and government mandates for energy conservation are the main factors of market growth in North America, which was the leading country in the global smart glass market in 2014.

A report titled “The Smart Wearables in Healthcare 2016-2030” has been highlighted on globenewswire.com as providing a thorough future outlook of wearables in improving the quality of lives from a healthcare and fitness perspective. One of the main purposes of the study was to identify the smart wearables that are presently available or being developed, and to evaluate their potential within the healthcare industry.
Some notable findings within the study are as follows:

• Almost 250 smart wearables are in stages of development by over 150 companies, many of these being activity/fitness trackers in the form of wrist wearables.
• Companies have propelled their efforts towards expanding more complex wearables in monitoring critical parameters, details of which can be found in the original article. There is also more focus on wearables that can provide therapeutic benefit.
• Smart wearables are growing in popularity on social media platforms, with the study capturing over 80,000 mentions of relevant keywords on social media in the last five years. This activity has dramatically heightened in the last couple of years.
• Innovation in smart wearables is evidently backed by venture capitalists according to the study, with findings of more than 180 examples of funding across 70 companies over the last few years. $US 3.1 billion is the ball park figure that has been invested, proving that interest in the area is high when it comes to venture capital firms and other investors.

Overall, it is expected that the market for smart wearables within the healthcare sector will grow at an annualized rate of 13.6% over the next fifteen years.

AREA member Huawei has been mentioned in an article on petapixel.com after teaming up with Leica for a second time to launch The Max Berek Innovation Lab. 5 months after launching the Huawei P9 smartphone, featuring dual Leica cameras, the companies have announced a partnership in launching a photography research and innovation center.

The article discloses that the lab is located in Leica’s headquarters in Germany, and is named after the German microscopy pioneer Max Berek, creator of Lecia’s first lens. Traditional photography, computational imaging, augmented reality and virtual reality are just a few of the fields in which the lab will be innovating. Improving imaging quality through improved physical optical systems and digital software-based technologies will also be on the agenda for researchers at the lab.

Huawei CEO Ren Zhengfei, explains that, “The Max Berek Innovation Lab provides the capacity to establish an even closer partnership with Leica, leading to continuous improvements in image and video quality. As a result, we will deliver the most advanced innovations in the smartphone camera market and bring greater value to consumers.”

A recent article on the BrainXChange website discusses the potential for Augmented and Virtual Reality in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry, particularly head-mounted displays. It explains how current visualization technologies are limited and confined to two-dimensional screens, therefore more advanced tech such as Augmented Reality is significantly more of an advantage in the field. Ways in which AR/VR technology could be useful in the AEC industry mentioned in the article include:

• Helping project managers to view schematics overlaid onto physical structures
• Allowing workers to view instructions for how to install tech
• Training future operators of a building
• Can help at all stages of a building project (design and actual construction)
• Improving both individual and group processes
• Eliminating inefficiencies
• Bridging knowledge gaps
• Streamlining processes
• Enables engineers and designers to easily visualize ideas and make more informed decisions
• Helps avoid rework during construction and customer dissatisfaction
• Can design buildings – e.g. recreating a physical structure using Virtual Reality
• Can remotely test out different design concepts
• Can virtually explore and assess an architectural plan
• Allowing the customer and construction team to thoroughly understand the building design
• Enhancing and speeding up the design process
• Enabling the design team to collaborate remotely
The article concludes by stating that AR/VR tech will be a game-changer for the AEC industry, and will increase innovation in engineers and designers.

AREA member BrainXChange recently interviewed Sam Murley, Digital Acceleration Designer at General Electric (GE). [Link to full interview].

Key points from the interview include:

•  Wearable technology improves productivity and efficiency
•  Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality, and wearable tech are best applied by streamlining the transfer of knowledge and offering vital information in context
• Anywhere information is accessed has the potential to be transformed by wearable tech
• Reducing risk and adding efficiencies are key focuses for pilot programs
• Main challenges of developing tech include:
• Keeping variables consistent (running a pilot as a scientific experiment)
• Scaling down a project without removing key features
• Meeting procedures and policies (e.g. IT security)
• Figuring out which is the best technology to fit the environment/end user
• Prioritising projects
• Researching emerging tech and partnering with new adopters of technology is important
• Smart glasses are key in transforming and mobilizing the workplace
• In future, we will no longer be limited to communicating, connecting, and creating information via physical screens
• Currently, the main issue with wearables is interoperability
• The change from mobile to digital assistants will soon arrive
• Part of the digital innovation strategy of companies should be to cover aspects beyond the interfaces and take calculated risks
• It is predicted that humans and robots will work in collaboration while using wearables at some point in the future