TechViz - Blog - AR / VR for engineering

Have you seen 2020’s Hype Cycle for Emerging technologies from Gartner?

Notice anything? Take some time to look at all the emerging technologies. Isn’t there something missing? Where is Virtual Reality? In a world where social distances and virtual collaboration has become essential to many industries, how come a technology like VR vanish from the Gartner Hype Cycle?

Many opportunities and challenges were brought by Industry 4.0 to the manufacturing industry. The new technologies connect digital and physical assets, which changes all the business processes. To embrace this radical change, companies must understand and master all the steps from product conception to selling. However, only Digital Champions have adopted these technologies today, and others will likely struggle to keep competitive. So far, only a few companies have emerged as Digital Champions and gotten all the benefits from Industry 4.0.

Virtual Reality is not as young as you thought it was, but don’t worry, it is common to think of VR devices as a new technology just arriving in our society as it became accessible to a larger number of people only recently. Since its first apparition, this cutting-edge technology constantly evolved, giving rise to a constant race for progress…nevertheless, it all started way sooner than you think.

Today, we are witnessing the digitization of manufacturing, a transformation so complete it compels the sector to find new business models and innovative solutions to increase productivity, profitability and safety of their employees. This transformation is called Industry 4.0. and deals with the huge amount of data that we are generating every day, and how to use it. One of the most effective ways to visualize and exploit this information is through Augmented and Virtual Reality (AR/VR). This enables new opportunities, especially for manufacturing industries.

Companies are relying on virtual reality (VR) more and more for business use. However, finding your way through the market offering of Head-Mounted Displays (HMDs), which is the fancy word for headsets. Picking the wrong system could end up limiting your ability to use VR Technology effectively. Here are some terms and concepts that might need some clearing up to choose the best VR headset for your company.

[Updated on March 9, 2022]

One of the main reasons some companies are still resisting the need to invest in VR is the lack of clear ROI (return on investment). Yet, some companies have taken the plunge long ago and with the benefit of hindsight, they can now tell how much extended reality (XR) has impacted their growth. According to a recent study from Forrester, Mixed Reality (MR) brought in a 3-year ROI of 177% for decision-makers.

As experts working in VR with industrial clients from 2004, we can give you some insight. Let’s see what ROI companies working in the BtoB market can expect when using XR.