Virtual reality has underground great developments, but it’s still difficult for some people to access it. It seems expensive and complicated to configure for a non-expert because of all the necessary equipment. The market can also appear a bit blurry for companies facing the large number of key players and suppliers. However, new ready-to-use solutions has emerged to facilitate the access to virtual reality and immersive techniques.
Making virtual reality accessible to all
The development of virtual reality and its application in the professional world has quickly led to new needs. The numerous use cases in fields such as industry, automotive, construction or training, show this growing interest for immersive techniques. Today, there are many solutions to improve employees’ work and to accelerate production. Large corporations like Volkswagen or Enedis use virtual reality and understand its benefits: time gain, risks and error reduction. But what about small companies?
To go further in the expansion and democratization of immersive techniques, key players of the VR/AR community conceived ready-to-use solutions. The objective is to offer a complete virtual reality ready to use, that is easy and quick to set up and above all accessible to everyone, whether the user is a novice or a tech enthusiast. These solutions take the form of suitcases that can be carried out everywhere and that contains all the necessary equipment to live an immersive experience. Let’s focus on three ready-to-use solutions on the market today.
All-in-one mobile solutions
Uptale’s Classroom Kit: immersive learning sessions for students
Employees and students training increasingly includes virtual reality. What we call immersive learning has positive results. The memorization rate goes up to 75% and even 90%, against only 10% for a traditional lecture. This figure is a motivation to use virtual reality and to create new immersive training tools.
Uptale provides a platform that allows companies to create their own immersive learning experience. Recently, the Parisian company created two new solutions, including the Classroom Kit. Carefully hidden in case that can be turned into a table, the virtual reality kit includes a tablet with the Classroom App on it, a WiFi router and 6 configured headsets.
With this kit, several people can follow a lesson at the same time. But each person lives its own experience independently. Meanwhile, the trainer can access to results data in real time on the tablet. For even more mobility, contents are also available offline.
The Classroom Kit enables to train several people at the same time in multiple locations: exhibitions, conferences, recruitment sessions. For example, the solution can help for the recruitment of new employees. Having them experience an immersive learning session can help to get a first look at their knowledge and skills.
The Schneider Electric Company has already benefited from the advantages of this method, by creating a safety training for new employees. The Classroom Kit, paired with the application and the platform, could allow to smaller companies to have access to learning contents and equipment to broadcast them afterwards.
HoloKase: the new Synergiz compact solution
In a similar objective, Synergiz also offers a ready-to-use solution. The company presented HoloKase during the last Paris Air Show. The promise is a ready-to-use technological toolbox. This suitcase gathers everything you need to do collaborative projects in virtual reality.
The HoloKase includes two HoloLens mixed reality headsets, a tablet, a WiFi router and a connection kit. This allows to have a mobile solution, easy to deploy, and mostly autonomous in terms of connectivity and energy. The complete set is directly configured for the user.
The Synergiz virtual reality kit is intended for industry and retail to make holographic presentations. Like the Uptale Classroom Kit, its installation is neither complicated nor time-consuming. Training centers and production sites can easily use this package.
The Airbus Defence and Space division adopted HoloKase for the repetitions of ground forces operations. The “Holographic Tactical Sandbox” program allows 10 military men to follow instructions on interactive maps. The briefing can also be done in collaboration and integrate several training centres remotely. Here, the use of mixed reality saves time and precision in comparison to traditional method.
InodCase: the plug-and-play right at your fingertips
Apart from these two new products, the start-up from Laval Inod sensed the potential of these solutions several years ago by marketing ready-to-use VR suitcases. Inod conceives solutions for real estate for professionals of the construction industry. The company offers to developers, architects and constructors to create virtual visits of projects before they emerge from the ground.
Logically, InodCase completed the other two existing solutions: InodView and InodApps. The commercialization of this suitcase aimed to help the distribution and exploitation of these two applications. The mobility is an important factor in the world of construction. Inod wanted to offer an easy-to-carry kit. The real estate developer or the architect can then show its project directly on the construction site or in its client’s home. Only five minutes are needed to install and start any virtual reality application.
Inod proposes two types of suitcase, each including a virtual reality headset, a computer with the Inod solution installed on it, and motion sensors. One of them has also a HTC Vive headset for maximum performances. The other is a more mobile and compact solution that suits in an aircraft cabin.
With the InodView solution, these suitcases allows real estate professionals to be fully autonomous. They can transform plans made on software into 3D models in order to create a virtual tour. This ready-to-use products pack helps accelerate sales and facilitate decision making.
Towards optimized experiments and tools
Mobility is one of the major challenges of virtual reality. On one side, users are looking for a better immersion in virtual reality experiences. This explains the launch of new solutions such as haptic technology and sensors to replace classic controllers. On the other hand, suppliers are developing more mobile and compact solutions. The development of wireless autonomous headsets is one proof.
Virtual reality suitcases participate in these challenges of mobility and distribution of the technology. No technicians or developers are needed to use them. No need to be a tech professional, all you have to do is follow the instructions provided with the kit. These ready-to-use solutions also overcome doubts about the amount of investment required. With these kits, a VR/AR project becomes more readable for the user because their sale or rental price is fixed. These suitcases allow to get familiar with the tool to imagine a project with a wider scope and more customized. They can be a first step for companies wishing to adopt virtual reality in the future.
