Tech: Lockheed is revealing the potential for virtual reality in the enterprise (LMT)

While a lot of the initial buzz around VR and AR has been in the gaming segment, these nascent technologies are seeing great progress in the enterprise as well.

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While a lot of the initial buzz around virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) has been in the gaming segment, these nascent technologies are seeing great progress in the enterprise as well.

Employees of Lockheed Martin and Boeing detailed how these companies are implementing VR and AR technologies at the VR & AR World event in London, as covered by LightReading.

• Lockheed Martin is using VR and AR to significantly decrease the error rate of integrating radar systems for navy ships, a process that's complex and requires precision; if the integration is off by one-hundredth of an inch, the system won’t work, and correcting these errors is expensive. AR and VR help Lockheed Martin to identify errors early on, as the VR HTC Vive-based application was much more effective in this regard than the 2D CAD system they relied on previously.
• Boeing plans to cut engineer training time by 75% by using the Microsoft HoloLens to train engineers in recognizing and combining different pieces of equipment, aided by digital text pop-ups and a voiceover providing guidance. Boeing is also using AR and VR for other purposes, including development of space transportation and to speed up maintenance processes.

While this is still early days for VR and AR implementation in the enterprise, the potential impact here is enormous. The combined VR and AR engineering market will be worth around $4.7 billion in 2025 and have 3.2 million users, heavily disrupting the CAD software market, according to Goldman Sachs.

Jessica Smith, research analyst for BI Intelligence, has compiled a detailed report on virtual reality that:

• Identifies the major players in today's VR hardware and platform markets.
• Estimates future growth of each of the major VR categories.
• Explores barriers to mass market consumer adoption for each of the VR hardware categories.
• Considers how developer sentiment is driving the growth of various platforms.
• Assesses how the market will shake out over the next five years in terms of size and the success of various VR hardware categories.

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While a lot of the initial buzz around VR and AR has been in the gaming segment, these nascent technologies are seeing great progress in the enterprise as well. Read Full Story