The business analogy is that of suppliers of a product or service facing their consumers, with facilitating organizations or services between the two major segments. The enterprise AR ecosystem is composed of segments in three groups:
- Customers
- Providers
- Non-commercial entities
Customers
The technical requirements and investments necessary to implement Augmented Reality may vary widely, depending on a company’s size and industry. For example, capital-intensive industries requiring up-front investments in physical plant, fleets of cars, etc., have a higher propensity to adopt AR sooner and invest in augmentation of maintenance and assembly procedures.
A distinction could also be made between those customers that perform all design, integration and deployment internally, and those that contract with outside groups for design, integration, hosting and other services that an AR-assisted project could need.
| Ecosystem Segment | Description |
| Large Enterprise AR Technology Customer | A large organization with gross annual revenues of more than $500M in a capital-intensive industry with high requirements for visualization in order to optimize complex workflows and tasks. To this end, it purchases hardware, software, communications services, integration services, etc. |
| Medium Enterprise AR Technology Customer | A medium-sized organization with gross annual revenues of between $50M and $500M in a capital-intensive industry with high requirements for visualization to optimize complex workflows and tasks. To this end, it purchases hardware, software, communications services, integration services, etc. |
| Enterprise AR Services Customer | An organization with gross annual revenues of less than $50M in a capital-intensive industry with high requirements for visualization to optimize complex workflows and tasks. To this end, it purchases turnkey or incremental enterprise AR services. |
Providers
The businesses of provider companies similarly vary widely in what they furnish the market. They can be grouped into software and multimedia publishers, hardware manufacturers, network providers or system integrators.
| Ecosystem Segment | Description |
| AR Experience Developer | Authors AR experiences and has all the skills necessary to design and develop enterprise AR experiences. This frequently includes development of custom software to supplement the commercial tools at their disposal. |
| AR Experience Publisher | Publishes AR experiences (internally developed or commissioned from third parties, and published separately or bundled in “applications”) on services where the experiences can be accessed remotely (e.g., appear in the catalog of a proprietary AR browser) or through an online store (e.g., AppStore, GooglePlay). |
| Enterprise AR Software Provider | Publishes and sells commercial software and maintains an ecosystem of experience developers using its products for enterprise AR application development and integration. |
| Enterprise AR Display Provider | Designs, builds and furnishes (via OEM or directly) hands-free displays, projection AR technology or other display components suitable for introduction and use in enterprise AR deployments. |
| Enterprise AR Hardware Provider | Designs, builds and furnishes (via OEM or directly) hardware other than displays and core enabling technologies suitable for introduction and use in enterprise AR deployments. |
| Core AR-Enabling Technology Provider | Develops and sells or licenses core AR-enabling technologies including but not limited to libraries and algorithms and hardware for sensors, sensor fusion and acceleration for integration into final enterprise AR products, services or systems. |
| Enterprise AR Integration (Custom) Services Provider | Designs and executes enterprise AR engineering projects under contract with customer. |
| Communications (Network) Provider | Provides communications services optimized for AR experience delivery, discovery, security, privacy and other factors meeting enterprise AR requirements on a one-time or recurring basis. |
Non-commercial Entities
Finally, there are non-commercial entities that facilitate communication and expansion among segments. These include research institutes (commercial or nonprofit) and providers of higher or continuing education.
| Ecosystem Segment | Description |
| Institute conducting AR research | Conducts basic and/or applied research on topics relevant to enterprise AR providers and customers and seeks partnerships with enterprise AR ecosystem to transfer technology, validate research and collaborate. |
| Nonprofit member organization | A trade organization or technology alliance that promotes enterprise AR among its members and amplifies the AREA voice/message. |
| Provider of higher education and professional training services | Provider of higher education and professional training services that includes enterprise AR in its curriculum and/or certifies professionals for enterprise AR services. |
Table: Enterprise AR Ecosystem Segments (PEREY Research & Consulting)