An opinion piece on Singularity Hub by Jiten Dajee provides insights on how other emerging tech trends are converging with Augmented Reality. It is when AR technology is viewed through the lens of combination with other technologies that we can truly begin to see its future potential.
The author takes the slant that by digging deeply into trends, cycles and clues from technology disruptions in the past, frameworks can be created to help us better strategize for how capabilities may unfold in the future. The reader is then taken through a number of technologies that are expected to converge with AR. It is through imagining what the combination of AR and industrial IoT, machine earning and 3D printing, among others, that we can begin to truly see its future potential.
The article offers the following insights into how those technologies will converge with AR:
Industrial IoT. Augmented reality and the industrial Internet of Things (IIOT) will most likely be the first to converge. AR device adoption is happening in the enterprise space at a faster pace than the consumer space. And similar to how consumer connectivity created value with the smartphone, enterprise connectivity will provide an information layer that’s expected to extend the value of AR devices.
As enterprises begin to rapidly develop connected infrastructure, from manufacturing to logistics, and ultimately to the consumer, massive amounts of data are being collected and used for analysis. AR can provide a “data to human interface,” allowing workers, managers and executives to see the world augmented with a rich dataset.
Enterprise resource planning, warehouse management and even electronic health record systems will be able to connect a workforce to its surrounding environment, whether a factory, warehouse or hospital—workers will be able to see information projected onto their environment. Eventually, the value will likely be driven upstream, as well into concepting, design, layout and other knowledge worker tasks, connecting the digital world to the physical one through connected data ecosystems.
Machine learning. Machine learning is expected to be an important convergence for AR, as well. We’ll need to figure out the best user interface for what amounts to a more hands-free experience. Just as the keyboard was an important innovation in desktop or laptop computing and touchscreens were the key to mobile devices—machine learning may play a big role in AR interfaces.
Moving from type to touchscreen is a great example of how new interfaces require novel UI. Machine-learning-enabled speech-to-text, as well as text-to-speech, could become important innovations in AR.
Our devices should understand the way we move, talk and touch. Data around user behavior will likely be extremely valuable, opening up markets to capture, transmit, store and utilize.
3D printing. 3D printing is an exploding market in industrial manufacturing, with unique potential benefits for complexity, performance and physical properties. However, specific 3D printing tools for modeling can be confusing for engineers trained on traditional design software for 2D monitors.
Often, the unique design requirements of complex 3D structures are not well suited for existing software tools. Crafting, editing and visualizing models with AR will help bridge the cognitive gap between engineer and design, removing the degrees of separation between designer and product that currently exist today (i.e., keyboard, mouse, 2D screen, interface), and enable the designer to directly interact with the product in an intuitive, creative way.
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Source: Why the Potential of Augmented Reality Is Greater Than You Think
