The 13th AREA Research Project

Research RFPs

Barriers to and Drivers of Adoption of Real-Time AR-assisted Inspection for Quality and Compliance

To submit a proposal for this research, please follow the guidance and complete the form below.

Background

Many industries have government or safety regulations with which companies must comply (e.g., OSHA for health and safety and QSIT defined by the FDA in the USA). In some industries and companies, inspectors must confirm that quality requirements (e.g., ISO 9001 and ISO 13485) are met. Frequently, an employee needs to wait for an independent and objective inspector to review and approve a task or product before continuing to another work order or repeating the tasks. This lowers employee productivity. Inspectors are limited in number and are valuable resources which, without automated or AR-enabled systems may spend a portion of their time traveling between sites where they perform inspections for relatively short duration. Despite efforts to be consistent and diligent, inspectors may also differ in their application of criteria between one another or between days and times of review, introducing variability and potential risks.

Executive Summary: AR-assisted inspection is a use case category with great potential for ROI across many industries but is not as well documented/publicized as step-by-step instruction delivery (task guidance), remote assistance and training. This project will study and document the most popular and the highest impact AR-assisted inspection use cases, identify barriers to their adoption and drivers or metrics to quantify their potential and propose implementation strategies.

Customer problem

• AREA members deploying AR for training, work instructions and other use cases may not have sufficient knowledge of system requirements, KPIs and features of existing commercial solutions focusing on AR-assisted inspection use cases, hence, are unable to take advantage of the added value these use cases could provide.
• AREA members lack insights into the inspection use cases, how regional regulations impact the use case ROI and the industries that perform inspections before work continues, and/or where there are requirements for inspections to be documented.
• AREA provider members may not be providing the fullest value proposition to their existing customers or are unable to tailor their offerings to specifically address inspection use cases without additional knowledge.
• As a result of a lack of detailed knowledge, metrics and implementation options for inspection for quality and compliance use cases, both provider and customer member segments could be missing opportunities to increase enterprise AR ROI.

Project Goals

• AREA members will be well informed about companies and industries in which AR-assisted inspection use cases are currently implemented, learn about commercial offerings for these use cases, how different regulatory environments impact adoption and have a clear set of requirements, KPIs and features for AR-assisted inspection use cases.
• The concerns of typical stakeholders that need to be educated about AR and “on-board” for the introduction and adoption of AR-assisted inspection, and existing barriers to adoption will be studied and documented. For each concern, a decision-support tool will propose proven strategies to mitigate perceived or real risks or shortcomings.
• Deployers of AR-assisted inspection solutions will be informed about the other components that need to be in place for the successful adoption of this use case.
• AREA members will possess an interactive guide (a decision-support tool) to evaluate commercial or custom solutions for AR-assisted inspection use cases and for measuring their potential impacts on the enterprise.

Deliverables

This AREA research project will produce the following deliverables:

D1 – A report documenting:

• Industries and regions (or regional regulations) that most likely will be impacted by AR-assisted inspection use cases
• Mandatory and optional features, KPIs and requirements for AR-assisted inspection use cases,
• Barriers to adoption of AR-assisted inspection use cases and how to identify solutions or strategies to increase adoption and lower the barriers

D2 – An interactive tool to assist the member to:

• Capture pre-AR metrics (KPIs) in inspection use cases to measure
• Calculate ROI of AR-assisted inspection use cases

D3 – A decision support tool for identifying and overcoming barriers to adoption, including but not limited to:

• List of current commercial solutions/platforms for AR-assisted inspection
• Methodology to evaluate/recognize solution features
• List of perceived or proven risks and strategies for mitigation

D4 – A webinar and executive summary for public audience

Proposal

The research project proposal will include (max 7 pages):

• Description of the research design and methodology (incl. explanation how it will measure requested goal, deliverables, and address the project topics)
• Project milestones and timeline
• Project risks, bias, and mitigation measures
• Potential or confirmed partners in the research
• Background and qualifications of the organization to perform research and any proposed partners
• Examples of other completed projects/reports (not included in page count)
• Names and contact information for up to three references

Selection Criteria

All proposals will be evaluated by the AREA research committee chairs and research manager on the following criteria:

• Experience in AR-assisted inspection use cases
• Track record in research and development
• Research methodology and ability to deliver statistically sound research
• Timeline
• Feedback of references

Timeline and Deadlines

Please use the form below to submit your proposal on or before 12 PM Eastern Daylight Time 15th September 2023. The AREA will provide detailed replies to submitters on or before 29th September 2023.

Unless otherwise negotiated in advance, the research project is expected to take approximately 110 days. Research will be completed, and finished deliverables provided to the AREA by January 17th 2024.

Budget for this Project

The AREA Research Committee budget for this project is $15,000.

Questions

For answers to any questions concerning this project and the AREA Research Committee, please send an email to the Research Committee.