Page 22 - Harvard Business Review (November-December, 2017)
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SPOTLIGHT WHY EVERY ORGANIZATION NEEDS AN AUGMENTED REALITY STRATEGY
Augmented reality, a set of technologies put navigation, collision warning, and
that superimposes digital data and other information directly in drivers’ line
images on the physical world, promises of sight are now available in dozens of car
to close this gap and release untapped models. Wearable AR devices for factory
and uniquely human capabilities. workers that superimpose production-
Though still in its infancy, AR is poised to assembly or service instructions are being
enter the mainstream; according to one piloted at thousands of companies. AR is
estimate, spending on AR technology supplementing or replacing traditional
will hit $60 billion in 2020. AR will manuals and training methods at an
affect companies in every industry and ever-faster pace.
many other types of organizations, from More broadly, AR enables a new
universities to social enterprises. In the information-delivery paradigm, which
coming months and years, it will transform we believe will have a profound impact
how we learn, make decisions, and interact on how data is structured, managed,
with the physical world. It will also change and delivered on the internet. Though
how enterprises serve customers, train the web transformed how information
employees, design and create products, and is collected, transmitted, and accessed,
manage their value chains, and, ultimately, its model for data storage and delivery—
how they compete. pages on flat screens—has major limits: It
In this article we describe what AR is, requires people to mentally translate 2-D
its evolving technology and applications, information for use in a 3-D world. That
and why it is so important. Its significance isn’t always easy, as anyone who has used
will grow exponentially as SCPs proliferate, a manual to fix an office copier knows. By
because it amplifies their power to create superimposing digital information directly
value and reshape competition. AR on real objects or environments, AR allows
will become the new interface between people to process the physical and digital
humans and machines, bridging the digital simultaneously, eliminating the need to
and physical worlds. While challenges mentally bridge the two. That improves
in deploying it remain, pioneering our ability to rapidly and accurately absorb
organizations, such as Amazon, Facebook, IN BRIEF information, make decisions, and execute
General Electric, Mayo Clinic, and the required tasks quickly and efficiently.
U.S. Navy, are already implementing AR THE PROBLEM AR displays in cars are a vivid illustration
and seeing a major impact on quality and While the physical world is of this. Until recently, drivers using GPS
three-dimensional, most
productivity. Here we provide a road map data is trapped on 2-D navigation had to look at a map on a flat
for how companies should deploy AR and screens and pages. This gulf screen and then figure out how to apply it in
explain the critical choices they will face in between the real and digital the real world. To take the correct exit from a
integrating it into strategy and operations. worlds limits our ability to busy rotary, for example, the driver needed
make the best use of the to shift his or her gaze between the road
volumes of information and the screen and mentally connect the
WHAT IS AUGMENTED REALITY? available to us. image on the map to the proper turnoff. AR
Isolated applications of AR have been THE SOLUTION heads-up displays lay navigational images
around for decades, but only recently Augmented reality directly over what the driver sees through
have the technologies required to unleash solves this problem by the windshield. This reduces the mental
its potential become available. At the superimposing digital effort of applying the information, prevents
core, AR transforms volumes of data and images and data on distraction, and minimizes driver error,
real objects. By putting
analytics into images or animations that information directly into the freeing people to focus on the road. (For
are overlaid on the real world. Today most context in which we’ll apply more on this, see the sidebar “Enhancing
AR applications are delivered through it, AR speeds our ability to Human Decision Making.”)
mobile devices, but increasingly delivery absorb and act on it. AR is making advances in consumer
will shift to hands-free wearables such as markets, but its emerging impact on human
head-mounted displays or smart glasses. THE OUTCOME performance is even greater in industrial
Pioneering organizations,
Though many people are familiar with including GE, Mayo Clinic, settings. Consider how Newport News
simple AR entertainment applications, and the U.S. Navy, are using Shipbuilding, which designs and builds
such as Snapchat filters and the game AR to improve productivity, U.S. Navy aircraft carriers, uses AR near
Pokémon Go, AR is being applied in far quality, and training. By the end of its manufacturing process to
more consequential ways in both consumer combining the strengths of inspect a ship, marking for removal steel
humans and machines, AR
and business-to-business settings. For will dramatically increase construction structures that are not part of
example, AR “heads-up” displays that value creation. the finished carrier. Historically, engineers
48 HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW NOVEMBER–DECEMBER 2017
