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Though we spend ample time examining consumer-based XR endpoints, greater near-term impact is seen in the enterprise. This includes brands that use AR to promote products in greater dimension (B2B2C) and industrial enterprises that streamline their own operations (B2B).
These industrial endpoints include visual support in areas like assembly and maintenance. The idea is that AR’s line-of-sight orientation can guide front-line workers. Compared to the “mental mapping” they must do with 2D instructions, visual support makes them more effective.
And with VR, employee training and onboarding can be elevated through immersive sequences that boost experiential learning and memory recall. It also scales given that far-flung employees can get the same quality training, versus costly travel for senior training staff.
Altogether, there are micro and macro benefits to enterprise XR. The above micro efficiencies add up to worthwhile bottom-line impact when deployed at scale. Macro benefits include lessening job strain and closing the “skills gap,” which can preserve institutional knowledge.
But how is this materializing today and who’s realizing enterprise XR benefits? Our research arm ARtillery Intelligence tackled these questions in a recent report. It joins our report excerpt series, with the latest below on Volvo’s activations with AR-guided quality assurance work.
Digital Threads
Fujitsu Network Communications provides on-premise network systems to enterprises. These are highly complex and customized assemblies – a level of nuance that opens the door for challenges in either pre-configuring assemblies or having enterprise customers do so on-site.
The latter approach is fairly common, which presents its own set of challenges in terms of support. Intricacies and customized configurations raise issues, and thus, friction with customers. So Fujitsu was keen to modernize its instructions beyond traditional paper formats.
To do this, it turned to PTC’s Vuforia Engine, running on Microsoft HoloLens.* This involved an app that integrated customer order information with design configuration data. These inputs converged, resulting in AR instructions that were overlaid on network equipment.
This not only indicated the right parts, but offered visual orientation for each step and what it should look like when complete. Operators start by scanning parts with the AR headset to properly identify them, as opposed to reading/confirming part numbers in previous methods.
Once scanned, the operator is then visually guided toward the proper part installation using color-coded directional arrows and other intuitive and positionally-accurate markings. The entire workflow is meant to lessen cognitive load, pursuant to reducing job strain and costly errors.
Key Consideration
So what were the results? Fujitsu was able to decrease training time from 3-5 days to 1 hour. Average system assembly decreased from 120 minutes to 97 minutes (19 percent), while transceiver installation – a common and difficult part – decreased from 53 minutes to 31 minutes.
As for strategic takeaways, Fujitsu’s success wasn’t just due to these performance improvements – a function of a well-designed system and product/market fit – but because it was sustainable. By that, we mean that it was adopted and used wholeheartedly by end users.
We’re talking about the operators who are dispatched to customer locations to assemble and/or maintain on-site systems. This adoption willingness was due to the clear benefits to a given operator, including less job strain and cognitive load, as noted, as well as greater accuracy.
These are all factors that resonate with operators. And this is a key consideration in enterprise XR as examined earlier in this report. It goes beyond the C-suite’s buy-in: any AR implementation is dead on arrival if it doesn’t have the buy-in and sustained commitment levels of end users.
The bottom line is that thoughtfully eliminating points of organizational resistance is critical in enterprise XR. It will often fly or die in a given deployment for reasons other than the technology’s efficacy. This makes communications and change management critical.
Photo by Florian Krumm on Unsplash
*Regarding the use of Microsoft HoloLens in this case study, it should be noted that the device has been discontinued by Microsoft. The lessons and insights of this case study are still valuable at broader levels and were derived during a period prior to HoloLens’ market retreat.