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Learn about continuous, ultra-cheap, personalized, and proactive healthcare

The U.S. healthcare industry is in for a major disruption in the decade ahead.

It is so broken, that it’s horrifying.

U.S. healthcare spending is expected to hit a total of US$3.6 trillion in 2019.

Fear of liability prompts U.S. doctors to spend US$210 billion per year on procedures patients don’t need.

Of every 5,000 new drugs introduced, 5 make it to human testing, and only one is ultimately approved. Yet even then, the average pharmaceutical product takes 12 YEARS to get from lab to patient, costing upwards of $2.5 billion.

Over the next five blogs, we’ll be diving into the digital medicine and biotech revolution unfolding before us. A new generation of AI-enabled, data-driven companies will transform what is today “sick care” into healthcare.

In this blog, we’ll look at a new generation of diagnostics that enable you to become the CEO of your own health. Ultimately, how you can catch disease at “stage-0” before it becomes life threatening.

Let’s dive in…

Continuous DIY Diagnostics

On a wintery Wednesday in January 2026, you’re being watched. Carefully watched.

Technically, you’re asleep in your bed, but Google’s home assistant knows your schedule. Thanks to your Oura ring, it also knows you’ve just completed a REM cycle and are now entering Stage 1 sleep—making it the perfect time to wake you up.

A gentle increase in the room’s lighting simulates the sunrise, while optimized light wavelengths maximize wakefulness and improve your mood.

“Hey Google, how’s my health this morning?” “One moment,” says your digital assistant.

It takes thirty seconds for the full diagnostic to run, which is pretty good considering the system deploys dozens of sensors capturing gigabytes of data.

Smart sensors in toothbrush and toilet, wearables in bedding and clothing, implantables inside your body—a mobile health suite with a 360-degree view of your system. “Your microbiome looks perfect,” Google tells you. “Also, blood glucose levels are good, vitamin levels fine…”

Google is developing a full range of internal and external sensors that monitor everything from blood sugar to blood chemistry.

And that’s just Google. The list of once multimillion-dollar medical machines now being dematerialized, demonetized, democratized, and delocalized—that is, made into portable and even wearable sensors—could fill a textbook.

Consider the spectrum of possibilities.

On the whiz-bang side, there’s Exo’s AI-enabled, cheap, handheld ultrasound 3D imager—meaning you will soon be able to track anything from wound-healing to fetus growth from the comfort of your home.

Or take former Google X project leader Mary Lou Jepsen’s startup, Openwater, which uses red laser holography to create a portable MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), turning what is today a multimillion-dollar machine into a wearable consumer electronics device. With successful rollout, products like that of Openwater could soon give three-quarters of the world access to medical imaging they currently lack.

Yet simpler developments might be more revolutionary.

In less than two decades, wearables have gone from first-generation step-counting self-trackers to Apple’s fourth-generation iWatch, which includes an FDA-approved ECG scanner capable of real-time cardiac monitoring.

Or look at Final Frontier Medical Devices’ DxtER (winner of the $10 million Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE): a collection of easy-to-use, noninvasive medical sensors, and a diagnostic AI, accessible via app. Already, DxtER reliably detects over fifty common ailments.

In convergence, these developments point towards a future of always-on health monitoring and cheap, easy diagnostics.

The technical term for this shift is “mobile health,” a field predicted to explode into a $102 billion market by 2022. Step aside, WebMD. The idea here is to put a virtual doctor, on demand, in your back pocket.

And we’re getting close.

Riding the convergence of networks, sensors, and computing, AI-backed medical chatbots are now flooding the market. These apps can diagnose everything from a rash to retinopathy.

And it’s not just physical ailments. Woebot is now taking on mental health, delivering cognitive behavioral therapy via Facebook Messenger to patients suffering from depression.

Proactive Healthcare

So where are these trends actually headed?

Take Human Longevity Inc., a company Peter Diamandis, co-founded in 2013. Its key offering, the “Health Nucleus” is an annual, three-hour health scan consisting of whole genome sequencing, whole body MRI, heart and lung CT, echocardiogram, and a slew of clinical blood tests—essentially the most complete picture of health currently available.

This picture is important for two reasons. The first is early disease detection.

In 2018, Human Longevity published stats on its first 1,190 clients. Nine percent of its patients uncovered previously undetected coronary artery disease (the number one killer in the world), 2.5 percent found aneurysms (the number two killer in the world), 2 percent saw tumors—and so forth. In total, a staggering 14.4 percent had significant issues requiring immediate intervention, while 40 percent found a condition that needed long-term monitoring.

The second reason this is important? Everything Human Longevity is measuring and tracking via half-day annual visits will soon come to you on demand. Thanks to always-on, always-watching sensors, your smartphone is about to become your doctor.

From Damage Control to Prevention

Skyrocketing AI capabilities, dematerializing sensors, and next-gen computing power are on the verge of embedding themselves in your wearables, home, future AR devices, and—one day—implantables.

In success, today’s era of lengthy, expensive, and reactive ‘sickcare’—mediated by insurance middlemen—is giving way to continuous, ultra-cheap, personalized, and proactive healthcare.

Soon to own our (technological) doctors (not to mention our health data), we will no longer correct for risk once losses are incurred. Instead, we’ll be minimizing risk 24/7, at extraordinarily low cost, without even thinking about it.

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In 2016, venture investments in VR exceeded US$800 million, while AR and MR received a total of $450 million. Just a year later, investments in AR and VR startups doubled to US$3.6 billion.

And today, major players are bringing VR headsets to market that have the power to revolutionize the industry, as well as countless others.

Already, VR headset sales volumes are expected to reach 98.4 million by 2023, according to Futuresource Consulting. But beyond headsets themselves, Facebook’s $399 Oculus Quest brought in US$5 million in content sales within the first two weeks post-release this past spring.

With companies like Niantic ($4B valuation), Improbable ($2B valuation), and Unity ($6B valuation) achieving unicorn status in recent years, the VR space is massively heating up.

In this blog, we will dive into a brief history of VR, recent investment surges, and the future of this revolutionary technology.

Brief History of VR

For all of history, our lives have been limited by the laws of physics and mitigated by the five senses. VR is rewriting those rules.

It’s letting us digitize experiences and teleport our senses into a computer-generated world where the limits of imagination become the only brake on reality. But it’s taken a while to get here.

Much like AI, the concept of VR has been around since the 60s. The 1980s saw the first false dawn, when the earliest “consumer-facing” systems began to show up. In 1989, if you had a spare $250,000, you could purchase the EyePhone before the iPhone, a VR system built by Jaron Lanier’s company VPL (Lanier coined the term ‘virtual reality’).

Unfortunately, the computer that powered that system was the size of a dorm room refrigerator, while the headset it required was bulky, awkward and only generated about five frames a second—six times slower than the average television of that era.

By the early 1990s, the hype had faded and VR entered a two-decade deceptive phase. Through the 2000s, the convergence of increasingly powerful game engines and AI-image rendering software flipped the script. Suddenly, deceptive became disruptive and the VR universe opened for business.

The Disruptive Phase: Surges in VR Investment

In 2012, Facebook spent $2 billion on Oculus Rift. By 2015, Venture Beat reported that an arena which typically saw only ten new entrants a year, suddenly had 234.

In June 2016, HTC announced the release of its ‘Business Edition’ of the Vive for $1,200, followed six months later by their announcement of a tether-less VR upgrade.

A year later, Samsung cashed in on this shift, selling 4.3 million headsets and turning enough heads that everyone from Apple and Google, to Cisco and Microsoft decided to investigate VR.

Phone-based VR showed up soon afterwards, dropping barriers to entry as low as $5. By 2018, the first wireless adaptors, standalone headsets and mobile headsets hit the market.

Resolution-wise, 2018 was also when Google and LG doubled their pixels-per-inch count and increased their refresh rate from VPL’s five frames a second to over 120.

Around the same time, the systems began targeting more senses than just vision. HEAR360’s “omni-binaural” microphone suite captures 360 degrees of audio, which means immersive sound has now caught up to immersive visuals.

Touch has also reached the masses, with haptic gloves, vests and full body suits hitting the consumer market. Scent emitters, taste simulators, and every kind of sensor imaginable—including brainwave readers—are all trying to put the “very” into verisimilitude.

And the number of virtual explorers continues to mount. In 2017, there were 90 million active users, which nearly doubled to 171 million by 2018. YouTube’s VR channel has over three million subscribers.

And that number is growing. By 2020, estimates put the VR market at $30 billion, and it’s hard to find a field that will be left untouched.

Future of VR: Emotive and Immersive Education  

History class, 2030. This week’s lesson: Ancient Egypt. The pharaohs, the queens, the tombs—the full Tut.

Sure, you’d love to see the pyramids in person. But the cost of airfare? Hotel rooms for the entire class? Plus, taking two weeks off from school for the trip? None of these things are doable. Worse, even if you could go, you couldn’t go. Many of Egypt’s tombs are closed for repairs, and definitely off-limits to a group of teenagers.

Not to worry, VR solves these problems. And in VR world, you and your classmates can easily breach Queen Nefertari’s burial chamber, touch the hieroglyphics, even scramble atop her sarcophagus—impossible opportunities in physical reality. You also have a world-class Egyptologist as your guide.

But turning your attention to the back of the tomb doesn’t require waiting until 2030. In 2018, Philip Rosedale and his team at High Fidelity pulled off this exact virtual field trip.

First, they 3D-laser scanned every square inch of Queen Nefertari’s tomb. Next, they shot thousands of high resolution photos of the burial chamber. By stitching together more than ten thousand photos into a single vista, then laying that vista atop their 3D-scanned map, Rosedale created a stunningly accurate virtual tomb. Next, he gave a classroom full of kids HTC Vive VR headsets.

Because High Fidelity is a social VR platform, meaning multiple people can share the same virtual space at the same time, the entire class was able to explore that tomb together. In total, their fully immersive field trip to Egypt required zero travel time, zero travel expenses.

VR will not only cover traditional educational content, but also expand our emotional education.

Jeremy Bailenson, founding director of Stanford’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab, has spent two decades exploring VR’s ability to produce real behavioral change. He’s developed first-person VR experiences of racism, sexism, and other forms of discrimination.

For example, experiencing what it would be like to be an elderly, homeless, African American woman living on the streets of Baltimore produces real change: A significant shift in empathy and understanding.

“Virtual reality is not a media experience,” explains Bailenson. “When it’s done well, it’s an actual experience. In general our findings show that VR causes more behavior changes, causes more engagement, causes more influence than other types of traditional media.”

Nor is empathy the only emotion VR appears capable of training. In research conducted at USC, psychologist Skip Rizzo has had considerable success using virtual reality to treat PTSD in soldiers. Other scientists have extended this to the full range of anxiety disorders.

VR, especially when combined with AI, has the potential to facilitate a top shelf traditional education, plus all the empathy and emotional skills that traditional education has long been lacking.

When AI and VR converge with wireless 5G networks, our global education problem moves from the nearly impossible challenge of finding teachers and funding schools for the hundreds of millions in need, to the much more manageable puzzle of building a fantastic digital education system that we can give away for free to anyone with a headset. It’s quality and quantity on demand.

In the workplace, VR will serve as an efficient trainer for new employees.

10,000 of Walmart’s 1.2 million employees have taken VR-based skills management tests. Learning modules that once took 35 to 45 minutes, now take 3 to 5. The company plans to train 1 million employees using the Oculus VR headset by the end of this year. The upfront costs of VR headsets will ultimately be recovered in labor efficiencies.

Multiple Worlds, Multiple Economies

We no longer live in only one place. We have real-world personae and online personae. This delocalized existence is only going to expand. With the rise of AR and VR, we’re introducing more layers to this equation.

You’ll have avatars for work and avatars for play and all of these versions of ourselves are opportunities for new businesses. Consider the multi-million-dollar economy that sprung up around the very first virtual world, Second Life. People were paying other people to design digital clothes and digital houses for their digital avatars.

Every time we add a new layer to the digital strata, we’re also adding an entire economy built upon that layer, meaning we are now conducting our business in multiple worlds at once.

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Please keep me in mind as your Executive Coach, openings for Senior Executive Engagements, and Board of Director openings. If you hear of anything within your network that you think might be a positive fit, I’d so appreciate if you could send a heads up my way. Email me: [email protected] or Schedule a call: Cliff Locks

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Augmented Reality (AR) has already exceeded over 2,000 AR apps on over 1.4 billion active iOS devices. Even if on a rudimentary level, the technology is now permeating the consumer products space.

And in just the next four years, the International Data Corporation (IDC) forecasts AR headset production will surge 141 percent each year, reaching a whopping 32 million units by 2023.

AR will soon serve as a surgeon’s assistant, a sales agent, and an educator, personalized to your kids’ learning patterns and interests.

In this fourth installment of our five-part AR series, I’m doing a deep dive into AR’s most exciting industry applications, poised to hit the market in the next 5-10 years.

Let’s dive in.

Healthcare 

(1) Surgeons and physicians: 

Whether through detailed and dynamic anatomical annotations or visualized patient-specific guidance, AR will soon augment every human medical practitioner.

To start, AR is already being used as a diagnosis tool. SyncThink, recently hired by Magic Leap, has developed eye-tracking technology to diagnose concussions and balance disorders. Yet another startup, XRHealth, launched its ARHealth platform on Magic Leap to aid in rehabilitation, pain distraction, and psychological assessment.

Moreover, surgeons at the Imperial College London have used Microsoft’s HoloLens 1 in pre-operative reconstructive and plastic surgery procedures, which typically involves using CT scans to map blood vessels that supply vital nutrients during surgery.

As explained by the project’s senior researcher, Dr. Philip Pratt, “With the HoloLens, we’re now doing the same kind of [scan] and then processing the data captured to make it suitable to look at. That means we end up with a silhouette of a limb, the location of the injury, and the course of the vessels through the area, as opposed to this grayscale image of a scan and a bit more guesswork.”

Dramatically lowering associated risks, AR can even help surgeons visualize the depth of vessels and choose the optimal incision location.

And while the HoloLens 1 was only used in pre-op visualizations, Microsoft’s HoloLens 2 is on track to reach the operating table. Take Philips’ Azurion image-guided therapy platform, for instance. Built specifically for the HoloLens 2, Azurion strives to provide surgeons with real-time patient data and dynamic 3D imagery as they operate.

Moreover, AR headsets and the virtual overlays they provide will exponentially improve sharing of expertise across hospitals and medical practices. Niche medical specialists will be able to direct surgeons remotely from across the country (not to mention the other side of the planet), or even view annotated AR scans to offer their advice.

Magic Leap, in its own right, is now collaborating with German medical company Brainlab to create a 3D spatial viewer that would allow clinicians to work together in surgical procedures across disciplines.

But beyond democratizing medical expertise, AR will even provide instantaneous patient histories, gearing doctors with AI-processed information for more accurate diagnoses in a fraction of the time.

By saving physicians’ time, AR will therefore free doctors to spend a greater percentage of their day engaging in face-to-face contact with their patients, establishing trust, compassion, and an opportunity to educate healthcare consumers (rather than merely treating them).

And when it comes to digital records, doctors can simply use voice control to transcribe entire interactions and patient visits, multiplying what can be done in a day, and vastly improving the patient experience.

(2) Assistance for those with disabilities: 

Today, over 3.4 million visually impaired individuals reside in the U.S. alone. But thanks to new developments in the AI-integrated smart glasses realm, associated constraints could soon fade in severity.

And new pioneers continue to enter the market, including NavCog, Horus, AIServe, and MyEye, among others. Microsoft has even begun development of a “Seeing AI” app, which translates the world into audio descriptions for the blind, as seen through a smartphone’s camera lens.

During the Reality Virtual Hackathon in January, hosted by Magic Leap at MIT, two of the top three winners catered to disabilities. CleARsite provided environment reconstruction, haptic feedback, and Soundfield Audio overlay to enhance a visually impaired individual’s interaction with the world. Meanwhile, HeAR used a Magic Leap 1 headset to translate vocals or sign language into readable text in speech bubbles in the user’s field of view. Magic Leap remains dedicated to numerous such applications, each slated to vastly improve quality of life.

(3) Biometric displays:

In biometrics, cyclist sunglasses and swimmer goggles have evolved into the perfect medium for AR health metric displays. Smart glasses like the Solos ($499) and Everysight Raptors ($599) provide cyclists with data on speed, power, and heart rate, along with navigation instructions. Meanwhile, Form goggles ($199)—just released at the end of August—show swimmers their pace, calories burned, distance, and stroke count in real-time, up to 32 feet underwater.

Accessible health data will shift off our wrists and into our fields of view, offering us personalized health recommendations and pushing our training limits alike.

Retail & Advertising

(1) Virtual shopping:

The year is 2030. Walk into any (now AI-driven, sensor-laden, and IoT-retrofitted) store, and every mannequin will be wearing a digital design customized to your preferences. Forget digging through racks of garments or hunting down your size. Cross-referencing your purchase history, gaze patterns, and current closet inventory, AIs will display tailor-made items most suitable for your wardrobe, adjusted to your individual measurements.

An app available on most Android smartphones, Google Lens is already leaping into this marketplace, allowing users to scan QR codes and objects through their smartphone cameras. Within the product, Google Lens’s Style Match feature even gives consumers the capability to identify pieces of clothing or furniture and view similar designs available online and through e-commerce platforms.

(2) Advertising:

And these mobile AR features are quickly encroaching upon ads as well.

In July, the New York Times debuted an AR ad for Netflix’s “Stranger Things,” for instance, guiding smartphone users to scan the page with their Google Lens app and experience the show’s fictional Starcourt Mall come to life.

But immersive AR advertisements of the future won’t all be unsolicited and obtrusive. Many will likely prove helpful.

As you walk down a grocery store aisle, discounts and special deals on your favorite items might populate your AR smart glasses. Or if you find yourself admiring an expensive pair of pants, your headset might suggest similar items at a lower cost, or cheaper distributors with the same product. Passing a stadium on the way to work, next weekend’s best concert ticket deals might filter through your AR suggestions—whether your personal AI intends them for your friend’s upcoming birthday or your own enjoyment.

Instead of bombarding you at every turn on a needed handheld device, ads will appear only when most relevant to your physical surroundings— or toggle them off, and have your personal AI do the product research for you.

Education & Travel

(1) Customized, continuous learning:

The convergence of today’s AI revolution with AR advancements gives us the ability to create individually customized learning environments.

Throw sensors in the mix for tracking of neural and physiological data, and students will soon be empowered to better mediate a growth mindset, and even work towards achieving a flow state (which research shows can vastly amplify learning).

Within the classroom, Magic Leap One’s Lumin operating system allows multiple wearers to share in a digital experience, such as a dissection or historical map. And from a collaborative creation standpoint, students can use Magic Leap’s CAD application to join forces on 3D designs.

In success, AR’s convergence with biometric sensors and AI will give rise to an extraordinarily different education system: one comprised of delocalized, individually customizable, responsive, and accelerated learning environments.

Continuous and learn-everywhere education will no longer be confined to the classroom. Already, numerous AR mobile apps can identify objects in a user’s visual field, instantaneously presenting relevant information. As user interface hardware undergoes a dramatic shift in the next decade, these software capabilities will only explode in development and use.

Gazing out your window at a cloud will unlock interactive information about the water cycle and climate science. Walking past an old building, you might effortlessly learn about its history dating back to the sixteenth century. I often discuss information abundance, but it is data’s accessibility that will soon drive knowledge abundance. 

(2) Training:

AR will enable on-the-job training at far lower costs in almost any environment, from factories to hospitals.

Smart glasses are already beginning to guide manufacturing plant employees as they learn how to assemble new equipment. Retailers stand to decimate the time it takes to train a new employee with AR tours and product descriptions.

And already, automotive technicians can better understand the internal components of a vehicle without dismantling it. Jaguar Land Rover, for instance, has recently implemented Bosch’s Re’flekt One AR solution. Training technicians with “x-ray” vision, the AR service thereby allows them to visualize the insides of Range Rover Sport vehicles without removing their dashboards.

In healthcare, medical students will be able to practice surgeries on artificial cadavers with hyper-realistic AR displays. Not only will this allow them to rapidly iterate on their surgical skills, but AR will dramatically lower the cost and constraints of standard medical degrees and specializations.

Meanwhile, sports training in simulators will vastly improve with advanced AR headset technology. Even practicing chess or piano will be achievable with any tabletop surface, allowing us to hone real skills with virtual interfaces.

(3) Travel:

As with most tasks, AI’s convergence with AR glasses will allow us to outsource all the most difficult (and least enjoyable) decisions associated with travel, whether finding the best restaurants or well-suited local experiences.

But perhaps one of AR’s more sophisticated uses (already rolling out today) involves translation. Whether you need to decode a menu or access subtitles while conversing across a language barrier, instantaneous translation is about to improve exponentially with the rise of AI-powered AR glasses. Even today, Google Translate can already convert menu text and street signs in real time through your smartphone.

Manufacturing

As I explored last week, manufacturing presents the nearest-term frontier for AR’s commercial use. As a result, many of today’s leading headset companies—including Magic Leap, Vuzix, and Microsoft—are seeking out initial adopters and enterprise applications in the manufacturing realm.

(1) Design:

Targeting the technology for simulation purposes, Airbus launched an AR model of the MRH-90 Taipan aircraft just last year, allowing designers and engineers to view various components, potential upgrades, and electro-optical sensors before execution. Saving big on parts and overhead costs, Airbus thereby gave technicians the opportunity to make important design changes without removing their interaction with the aircraft.

(2) Supply chain optimization: 

AR guidance linked to a centralized AI will also mitigate supply chain inefficiencies. Coordinating moving parts, eliminating the need to hold a scanner at each checkpoint, and directing traffic within warehouses will vastly improve workflow.

After initially implementing AR “vision picking” in 2015, leading supply company DHL recently announced it would continue to use the newest Google smart lens in warehouses across the world. Or take automotive supplier ZF, which has now rolled out use of the HoloLens in plant maintenance.

(3) Quality assurance & accessible expertise:

AR technology will also play a critical role in quality assurance, as it already does in Porsche’s assembly plant in Leipzig, Germany. Whenever manufacturers require guidance from engineers, remote assistance is effectively no longer remote, as equipment experts guide employees through their AR glasses and teach them on the job.

Transportation & Navigation

(1) Autonomous vehicles:

To start, Nvidia’s Drive platform for Level 2+ autonomous vehicles is already combining sensor fusion and perception with AR dashboard displays to alert drivers of road hazards, highlight points of interest, and provide navigation assistance.

And in our current transition phase of partially autonomous vehicles, such AR integration allows drivers to monitor conditions yet eases the burden of constant attention to the road. Along these lines, Volkswagen has already partnered with Nvidia to produce I.D. Buzz electric cars, set to run on the Drive OS by 2020. And Nvidia’s platform is fast on the move, having additionally partnered with Toyota, Uber, and Mercedes-Benz. Within just the next few years, AR displays may be commonplace in these vehicles.

(2) Navigation:

We’ve all seen (or been) that someone spinning around with their smartphone to decipher the first few steps of a digital map’s commands. But AR is already making everyday navigation intuitive and efficient.

Google Maps’ AR feature has already been demoed on Pixel phones: instead of staring at your map from a bird’s eye view, users direct their camera at the street, and superimposed directions are immediately layered virtually on top.

Not only that, but as AI identifies what you see, it instantaneously communicates with your GPS to pinpoint your location and orientation. Although a mainstream rollout date has not yet been announced, this feature will likely make it to your phone in the very near future.

Entertainment

(1) Gaming:

We got our first taste of AR’s real-world gamification in 2016, when Nintendo released Pokémon Go. And today, the gaming app has now surpassed 1 billion downloads. But by contrast to VR, AR is increasingly seen as a medium for bringing gamers together in the physical world, encouraging outdoor exploration, activity, and human connection in the process.

And in the recently exploding eSports industry, AR has the potential to turn player’s screens into live action stadiums. Just this year, the global eSports market is projected to exceed US$1.1 billion in revenue, and AR’s potential to elevate the experience will only see this number soar.

(2) Art:

Many of today’s most popular AR apps allow users to throw dinosaurs into their surroundings (Monster Park), learn how to dance (Dance Reality), or try on highly convincing virtual tattoos (InkHunter).

And as high-definition rendering becomes more commonplace, art will, too, grow more and more accessible.

Magic Leap aims to construct an entire “Magicverse” of digital layers superimposed on our physical reality. Location-based AR displays, ranging from art installations to gaming hubs, will be viewable in a shared experience across hundreds of headsets. Individuals will simply toggle between modes to access whichever version of the universe they desire. Endless opportunities to design our surroundings will arise.  

Apple, in its own right, recently announced the company’s [AR]T initiative, which consists of floating digital installations. Viewable through [AR]T Viewer apps in Apple stores, these installations can also be found in [AR]T City Walks guiding users through popular cities, and [AR]T Labs, which teach participants how to use Swift Playgrounds (an iPad app) to create AR experiences.

(3) Shows:

And at the recent Siggraph Conference in Los Angeles, Magic Leap introduced an AR-theater hybrid called Mary and the Monster, wherein viewers watched a barren “diorama-like stage” come to life in AR.

Source: Venture Beat.

While audience members shared the common experience like a traditional play, individuals could also zoom in on specific actors to observe their expressions more closely.

Say goodbye to opera glasses and hello to AR headsets.

Final Thoughts

While AR headset manufacturers and mixed reality developers race to build enterprise solutions from manufacturing to transportation, AR’s use in consumer products is following close behind.

Magic Leap leads the way in developing consumer experiences we’ve long been waiting for, as the “Magicverse” of localized AR displays in shared physical spaces will reinvent our modes of connection.

And as AR-supportive hardware is now built into today’s newest smartphones, businesses have an invaluable opportunity to gamify products and immerse millions of consumers in service-related AR experiences.

Even beyond the most obvious first-order AR business cases, new industries to support the augmented world of 2030 will soon surge in market competition, whether headset hardware, data storage solutions, sensors, or holograph and projection technologies.

Jump on the bandwagon now— the future is faster than you think!

Board of Directors | Board of Advisors | Strategic Leadership

Please keep me in mind as your Executive Coach, openings for Senior Executive Engagements, and Board of Director openings. If you hear of anything within your network that you think might be a positive fit, I’d so appreciate if you could send a heads up my way. Email me: [email protected] or Schedule a call: Cliff Locks

Download Resume (PDF)

#BoardofDirectors #BoD #artificialintelligence #AI #innovation #IoT #virtualreality #vr #AR #augmentedreality #HR #executive #business #CXO #CEO #CFO #CIO #BoardofDirectors #executive #success #work #follow #leadership #Engineering #corporate #office #Biotech #Cleantech #CAD #entrepreneur #coaching #businessman #professional #excellence #development #motivation Contributors: Peter Diamandis and Clifford Locks #InvestmentCapitalGrowth

Today, adults in the U.S. spend over nine hours a day looking at screens. That counts for more than a third of our livelihoods.

Yet even though they serve as a portal to 90 percent of our media consumption, screens continue to define and constrain how and where we consume content, and they may very soon become obsolete.

Riding new advancements in hardware and connectivity, augmented reality (AR) is set to replace these 2D interfaces, instead allowing us to see through a digital information layer. And ultimately, AR headsets will immerse us in dynamic stories, learn-everywhere education, and even gamified work tasks.

If you want to play AR Star Wars, you’re battling the Empire on your way to work, in your cubicle, cafeteria, bathroom and beyond.

We got our first taste of AR’s real-world gamification in 2016, when Nintendo released Pokemon Go. Thus began the greatest cartoon character turkey shoot in history. With 5 million daily users, 65 million monthly users, and over $2 billion in revenue, the virtual-overlaid experience remains one for the books.

In the years since, similar AR apps have exploded. Once thick and bulky, AR glasses are becoming increasingly lightweight, stylish, and unobtrusive. And over the next 15 years, AR portals will become almost unnoticeable, as hardware rapidly dematerializes.

Companies like Mojo Vision are even rumored to be developing AR contact lenses, slated to offer us heads-up display capabilities — no glasses required.

In this second installation of our five-part AR blog series, we are doing a deep dive into the various apps, headsets, and lenses on the market today, along with projected growth.

Let’s take a look…

Mobile AR

We have already begun to sample AR’s extraordinary functions through mobile (smartphone) apps. And the growth of the market is only accelerating.

Snap recently announced it will raise $1 billion in short-term debt to invest in media content, acquisitions, and AR features. Both Apple and Google are racing to deploy phones with requisite infrastructure to support hyper-realistic AR.

And in the iOS space, developers use ARKit in iPhone software, from the SE to the latest-generation X, to bring high-definition AR experiences to life. Apple CEO Tim Cook has repeatedly emphasized his belief that AR will “change the way we use technology forever.”

While recent rumors reveal the company’s AR glasses project has been discontinued, Apple’s foray in AR is far from over. Just recently, the tech giant broadcasted a large collection of job postings for AR and VR experts. And although somewhat speculative, Apple is likely waiting for the consumer market to mature before releasing its first-generation AR glasses or pivoting towards an entirely new AR hardware product.

For now, Apple seems to be promoting the extensive hardware advancements showcased by its A12 bionic chip, not to mention the variety of apps available in its App Store.

• In the productivity realm: IKEA place allows users to try out furniture in the home, experimenting with styles and sizing before ordering online. Or take Vuforia Chalk, a novel AR tool that helps customers fix appliances with real-time virtual assistance. As users direct their smartphone cameras towards troublesome appliances, remote tech support workers can draw on consumers’ screens to guide them through repair steps.
• As to the AR playground, Monster Park brings Jurassic Park dinosaurs into any landscape you desire, immersing you in a modern-day Mesozoic Era. Meanwhile, Dance Reality can guide you through detailed steps and timing of countless dance styles.
• In virtually immersive learning, BBC’s Civilisations lets you hold, spin, and view x-rays of ancient artifacts while listening to historical narrations. WWF’s Free Rivers transforms your tabletop into natural landscapes, from the Himalayas to the African Sahara, allowing you to digitally manipulate entire ecosystems to better understand how water flow affects habitats.
• Or even create your own DIY AR worlds and objects using Thyng.

Yet for Android users, options are just as varied, based on the Android software-compatible ARCore used by developers. While the recently announced Google Glass Enterprise Edition 2 aims to capture enterprise clients, Android smartphone hardware provides remarkable AR experiences for everyday consumers.

• For sheer doodling, DoodleLens (Android APP) brings your doodles to life, transforming paper drawings into 3D animated figures that you can place and manipulate in your physical environment. And even more directly, Just a Line (Android APP) allows anyone to create a 3D drawing within their physical surroundings, making space itself an endless canvas.
• Learn as you travel: Google Translate (Android APP) can now take an image of any foreign street sign, menu, or label and provide instantaneous translation in real time. And beyond Earth-bound adventures, the now open-sourced Sky Map (Android APP) guides you through constellations across the night sky.
• Even alter your own body with Inkhunter, (Android APP) which allows users to preview any potential tattoo design on their skin. Or as is familiar to most younger folks, change your look with Snapchat’s (Android APP) computer vision-derived filters, which have already reached 90 percent of 12-to 24-year-olds in the U.S.

Leading Headsets

Although the number of AR headsets breaking into the market may seem overwhelming, a few of the top contenders are now pushing the envelope in everything from wide FOV immersion to applications in enterprise.

(1) Highest Resolution

DreamGlass: Connected to a PC or Android-based smartphone, DreamWorld’s headset offers 2.5K resolution in each lens, beating out Full HD resolution screens, but in AR. Now flooded by investment, resolution improvements minimize pixel size, reducing the “screen door effect,” whereby pixel boundaries disrupt the image like a screen’s mesh. Offering unprecedented levels of hand- and head-tracking precision, the headset even features 6 degrees of freedom (i.e. axes of directional rotation).

And with a flexible software development kit (SDK), supported by Unity and Android, the device is highly accessible to developers, making it a ready candidate for countless immersive experiences. Already at $619, the DreamGlass and comparable technology are only falling in price.

(2) Best for Enterprise

Google Glass Enterprise Edition 2: In just four years (since Google’s release of the last iteration), the Google Glass has gotten a major upgrade, now geared with an 8-megapixel camera, detachable lens, vastly increased battery life, faster connection, and ultra-high-performance Snapdragon XR1 CPU. Already, the Glass has been sold to over 100 businesses, including GE, agricultural machinery manufacturer AGCO, and health record company Dignity Health.

But perhaps most remarkable are the bucks AR can make for business. Using the Glass, GE has increased productivity by 25 percent, and DHL improved its supply chain efficiency by 15 percent. While only (currently) available for businesses, the new-and-improved AR glasses stand at $999 and will continue to ride plummeting production costs.

(3) Democratized AR

Vuzix Blade: Resembling chunky Oakley sunglasses, these smart glasses are extraordinarily portable, with a built-in Android OS as well as both WiFi and Bluetooth connection. Designed for everyday consumer use (at a price point of $700), the Vuzix Blade is slowly chipping away at smartphone functionalities. For easy control of an intuitive interface, a touchpad on the device’s temples allows consumers to display everything from social media platforms and user messages to “light AR” experiences. Meanwhile, an 8MP HD camera makes your phone camera null and void, allowing users to remain immersed in their experience while digitally capturing it at the same time. All the while, built-in Alexa capabilities and vibration alerts extend users’ experience beyond pure visual stimulation.

(4) Widest Field of View (FOV)

Microsoft HoloLens 2: This newly announced headset leads the industry with a 43° x 29° FOV, more than double its (2016-released) predecessor’s capability. But this drastic increase in visual immersiveness is far from the only device improvement. For improved long-use comfort, the headset’s center of gravity now rests on the top of the head, moving away from typical front-loaded headsets.

An even more novel functionality, tiny cameras on the nose bridge verify a user’s identity by scanning the wearer’s eyes and customizing the display based on distance between pupils. Once accompanied by emotion-deducing AIs (now under development), this tracking technology could even evolve to intuitively predict a user’s desires and emotional feedback in future models. Geared with a Qualcomm 850 mobile processor and Microsoft’s own AI engine built-in, Hololens’ potential is limitless.

(5) Class A Comfort

Magic Leap One: Weighing less than 0.8 pounds, this headset provides one of the most lightweight experiences available today with a 40° x 30° FOV, just barely eclipsed by that of Microsoft’s HoloLens 2. En route to dematerialization, Magic Leap merely requires a small “Lightpack” attachment in the wearer’s pocket, connected via cable to the goggles. A handheld controller additionally contains a touchpad, haptic feedback, and six degrees of freedom motion sensing. Meanwhile, light sensors make the digital renderings even more realistic, as they reflect physical light into the viewer’s space.

Teasing AR’s future convergence with AI, Magic Leap even features a virtual human called “Mica,” which responds to a user’s emotions (detected through eye-tracking) by returning a smile or offering a friendly gesture.

Final Thoughts

As headsets plummet in price and size, AR will rapidly permeate households over the next decade.

Once we have mastered headsets and smart glasses, AR-enabled contact lenses will make our virtually enhanced world second nature.

And ultimately, BCIs will directly interface with our neural signals to provide an instantaneous, seamlessly intuitive connection, merging our minds with limitless troves of knowledge, rich human connection, and never-before-possible experiences.

While only approaching the knee of the curve, these pioneering mobile apps and novel headset technologies explored above will soon give rise to one of the most revolutionary industries yet to be seen— one that will fundamentally transform our lives.

Just remember over 120 million workers throughout the world (11.5 million in the U.S.) will need to be retrained in the next three years due to artificial intelligence, according to an IBM survey. “Upskilling” these workers will be a big challenge as workers today require more training than ever to learn new skills — 36 days versus three days in 2014, per IBM. And often skills most valued by employers (“soft skills” like communication and ethics) take more time to develop.

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Augmented Reality is about to add a digital intelligence layer to our every surrounding, transforming retail, manufacturing, education, tourism, real estate, and almost every major industry that holds up our economy today.

Just last year, the global VR/AR market hit a value of $814.7 billion, and it is only expected to continue surging at a 63 percent CAGR until 2025.

Apple’s Tim Cook has remarked, “I regard [AR] as a big idea like the smartphone […] The smartphone is for everyone. We don’t have to think the iPhone is about a certain demographic, or country, or vertical market. It’s for everyone. I think AR is that big, it’s huge.”

And as Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, and numerous other players begin entering the AR market, we are on the cusp of witnessing a newly augmented world.

In one of the greatest technological revolutions of this century, smartphones dematerialized cameras, stereos, video game consoles, TVs, GPS systems, calculators, paper, and even matchmaking as we knew it.

AR glasses will soon perpetuate this, ultimately dematerializing the smartphone itself. We will no longer gaze into tiny, two-dimensional screens but rather see through a fully immersive, 3D interface.

While already beginning to permeate mobile applications, AR will soon migrate to headsets, and eventually reach us through contact lenses — replacing over 3 billion smartphones in use today.

I am immensely excited about this five-part AR blog series. In it, we will cover:

• Importance of AR as an emerging technology
• Leading AR hardware
• AR convergence with AI, blockchain, and sensors
• Industry-specific applications
• Broader implications of the AR Cloud

Let’s dive in!

Introducing the Augmented World

AR superimposes digital worlds onto physical environments (by contrast to VR, which completely immerses users in digital realities). In this way, AR allows users to remain engaged with their physical surroundings, serving as a visual enhancement rather than replacement.

As AR hardware costs continue to plummet — and advancements in connectivity begin enabling low-latency, high-resolution rendering — today’s AR producers are initially targeting businesses through countless enterprise applications.

And while AR headsets remain too pricey for widespread consumer adoption, distribution is fast increasing. Roughly 150,000 headsets were shipped in 2016, and this number is expected to reach 22.8 million by 2022.

Meanwhile, AR app development has skyrocketed, allowing smartphone users to sample rudimentary levels of the technology through numerous mobile applications. Already, over 1 billion people across the globe use mobile AR, and a majority of mobile AR integrations involve social media (84%) and e-commerce (41%).

Yet while well-known players like Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, Qualcomm, Samsung, NVIDIA, and Intel have made tremendous strides, well-funded startups remain competitive.

Magic Leap, a company aiming to eliminate the screen altogether, has raised a total of $2.6 billion since its founding in 2010. With its own head-mounted virtual retinal display, Magic Leap projects a digital light field into users’ eyes to superimpose 3D computer-generated imagery over set environments, whether social avatars, news broadcasts or interactive games.

Mojo Vision, in its own right, has raised $108 million in its efforts to develop and produce an AR contact lens. Or take Samsung’s recently granted U.S. patent to develop smart lenses capable of streaming text, capturing videos, and even beaming images directly into a wearer’s eyes. Given their multi-layered lens architecture, the contacts are even designed to include a motion sensor (for eye movement tracking), hidden camera, and display unit.

And as of this writing, nearly 1,800 different AR startups populate the crowdfunding site Angel’s List.

While AR isn’t (yet) as democratized as VR, $100 will get you an entry-level Leap Motion headset, while a top-of-the-line Microsoft HoloLens 2 remains priced at $3,500. However, heads-up-displays in luxury automobiles — arguably the first AR applications to go mainstream — will soon become a standard commodity in economy models.

And as corporate partnerships with AR startups grow increasingly common, the convergence of augmented reality with sensors, networks, and IoT will transform almost every industry imaginable.

A Taste of Industry Transformations

Over the next few weeks of blogs, we will do a deeper dive into each industry, but it is worth considering some of AR’s most notable implications across a range of sectors.

In Manufacturing & Industry, AR training simulations are already beginning to teach us how to operate numerous machines and equipment, even to fly planes. Microsoft, for instance, is targeting enterprise clients with its HoloLens 2, as the AR device’s Remote Assist function allows workers to call in virtual guidance if unfamiliar problems arise in the manufacturing process.

Healthcare: AR will allow surgeons to “see inside” clogged arteries, provide precise incision guides, or flag potential risks, introducing seamless efficiency in everything from reconstructive surgeries to meticulous tumor removals. Medical students will use AR to peel back layers on virtual cadavers. And in everyday health, we will soon track nearly every health and performance metric — whether heart rate, blood pressure, or nutritional data — through AR lenses (as opposed to wearables).

Education: In our classrooms, AR will allow children (and adults alike!) to explore both virtual objects and virtual worlds. But beyond the classroom, we will have the option to employ AR as a private teacher wherever we go. Buildings will project their history into our field of view. Museums might have AR-enhanced displays. Every pond and park will double as a virtual-overlaid lesson in biology and ecology. Or teach your children the value of money with virtual budgeting and mathematical tabulations at grocery and department stores. Already, apps like Sky Map and Google Translate allow users to learn about their surroundings through smartphone camera lenses, and AR’s teaching capabilities are only on the rise.

Yet Retail & Advertising take AR’s transformative potential to a new level. Hungry and on a budget? Your smart AR contact lenses might show you all available lunch specials on the block, cross-referenced with real-time customer ratings, special deals, and your own health data for individualized recommendations. Storefront windows will morph to display your personalized clothing preferences, continuously tracked by AI, as eye-tracking technology allows your AR lenses to project every garment that grabs your attention onto your form, in your size. Smart AR advertising — if enabled — will target your every unique preference, transparently informing you of comparable, cheaper options the minute you reach for an item.

And in Entertainment, we will soon be able to toggle into imaginary realities, or even customize physical spaces with our own designs. 3D creations will become intuitive and shareable. Sports player stats will be superimposed onto live sporting events, as spectators recreate immersive stadiums with front-row seats in their own backyards. Turn on game mode, and every streetside, park, store, and neighborhood merges into a virtually overlaid game, socially interactive and interspersed with everyday life.

In Transportation, AR displays integrated in vehicle windows will allow users to access real-time information about the restaurants, stores, and landmarks they pass. Walking, biking, and driving directions will be embedded in our routes through AR. And when sitting in your autonomous vehicle-turned office on the way to work, AR will have the power to convert any vessel into a virtual haven of your choice.

A Day in the Life of 2030

Reaching for your AR-enabled glasses upon waking up, your Jarvis-like AI populates your visual field with any new updates and personalized notifications.

You begin the day with a new pancake recipe, directed seamlessly by a cooking app in your AR glasses, with ingredients tailored to new programmed dietary preferences. Glancing at your plate, your glasses inform you of the meal’s nutritional value, tracking these metrics in your health monitor.

As you need to fly cross-country today, your AI hails an autonomous shuttle to the airport. Along the way, you switch your glasses to creation mode, allowing you to populate entire swaths of the city with various art pieces your friends have created in the virtual world. Dropping a few of your own 3D designs across the city, your AR glasses even allow you to turn the vehicle floor into a virtual pond as you glide along a smart highway (equipped for electric vehicle charging).

Upon arriving at the airport, your AR glasses switch gears to navigation mode, displaying arrows that direct you seamlessly to your boarding gate.

Walking into your hotel, you activate tourist mode, offering a number of facts and relevant figures about nearby historical buildings and monuments. Toggle to restaurant mode for a look at nearby eatery reviews, tailored to the colleagues you’ll be dining with.

Winding down, you briefly scroll through some pictures captured with your glasses throughout the day, sharing them with family through an interface completely controlled via eye movements.

Welcome to the augmented world of 2030.

Final Thoughts

While enterprises are fueling initial deployment of AR headsets for employee training and professional retooling, widespread consumer adoption is fast reaching the horizon. And as hardware and connectivity skyrocket, driving down prices and democratizing access, sleek AR glasses — if not dematerialized lenses — will become an everyday given.

Advancements in cloud computing and 5G coverage are making AR products infinitely more scalable, ultra-fast, and transportable.

Yet ultimately, AR will give rise to neural architectures directly embedded through brain-computer interfaces. Our mode of interaction with the IoT will evolve from smartphone screens, to AR glasses, to contact lenses, to BCIs.

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As I often tell my clients, people generally remember only 10 percent of what we see, 20 percent of what we hear, and 30 percent of what we read…. But over a staggering 90 percent of what we do or experience.

By introducing gamification, immersive testing activities, and visually rich sensory environments, adult literacy platforms have a winning chance at scalability, retention and user persistence.

Beyond literacy, however, virtual and augmented reality have already begun disrupting the professional training market.

As projected by ABI Research, the enterprise VR training market is on track to exceed $6.3 billion in value by 2022.

Leading the charge, Walmart has already implemented VR across 200 Academy training centers, running over 45 modules and simulating everything from unusual customer requests to a Black Friday shopping rush.

Then in September of last year, Walmart committed to a 17,000-headset order of the Oculus Go to equip every U.S. Supercenter, neighborhood market, and discount store with VR-based employee training.

In the engineering world, Bell Helicopter is using VR to massively expedite development and testing of its latest aircraft, FCX-001. Partnering with Sector 5 Digital and HTC VIVE, Bell found it could concentrate a typical six-year aircraft design process into the course of six months, turning physical mockups into CAD-designed virtual replicas.

But beyond the design process itself, Bell is now one of a slew of companies pioneering VR pilot tests and simulations with real-world accuracy. Seated in a true-to-life virtual cockpit, pilots have now tested countless iterations of the FCX-001 in virtual flight, drawing directly onto the 3D model and enacting aircraft modifications in real-time.

And in an expansion of our virtual senses, several key players are already working on haptic feedback. In the case of VR flight, French company Go Touch VR is now partnering with software developer FlyInside on fingertip-mounted haptic tech for aviation.

Dramatically reducing time and trouble required for VR-testing pilots, they aim to give touch-based confirmation of every switch and dial activated on virtual flights, just as one would experience in a full-sized cockpit mockup. Replicating texture, stiffness and even the sensation of holding an object, these piloted devices contain a suite of actuators to simulate everything from a light touch to higher-pressured contact, all controlled by gaze and finger movements.

Learn Anything, Anytime, at Any Age

When it comes to other high-risk simulations, virtual and augmented reality have barely scratched the surface.

Firefighters can now combat virtual wildfires with new platforms like FLAIM Trainer or TargetSolutions. And thanks to the expansion of medical AR/VR services like 3D4Medical or Echopixel, surgeons might soon perform operations on annotated organs and magnified incision sites, speeding up reaction times and vastly improving precision.But perhaps most urgently, Virtual Reality will offer an immediate solution to today’s constant industry turnover and large-scale re-education demands.

VR educational facilities with exact replicas of anything from large industrial equipment to minute circuitry will soon give anyone a second chance at the 21st-century job market.

Want to become an electric, autonomous vehicle mechanic at age 44? Throw on a demonetized VR module and learn by doing, testing your prototype iterations at almost zero cost and with no risk of harming others.
Want to be a plasma physicist and play around with a virtual nuclear fusion reactor? Now you’ll be able to simulate results and test out different tweaks, logging Smart Educational Record credits in the process.

As tomorrow’s career model shifts from a “one-and-done graduate degree” to continuous lifelong education, professional VR-based re-education will allow for a continuous education loop, reducing the barrier to entry for anyone wanting to try their hand at a new industry.

Whether in pursuit of fundamental life skills, professional training, linguistic competence or specialized retooling, users of all ages, career paths, income brackets and goals are now encouraged to be students, no longer condemned to stagnancy.

As VR and artificial intelligence converge with demonetized mobile connectivity, we are finally witnessing an era in which no one will be left behind.

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Please keep me in mind as your Executive Coach, openings for Senior Executive Engagements, and Board of Director openings. If you hear of anything within your network that you think might be a positive fit, I’d so appreciate if you could send a heads up my way. Email me: [email protected] or Schedule a call: Cliff Locks

Contributor: Peter Diamandis