byBrick sends Oculus Rift into the heavy industry segment

Oculus Rift have yet to launch its first commercial kit, and gamers are waiting eagerly to step into their virtual worlds. But the greatest value may be applying new Virtual Reality devices such as the Oculus Rift in industrial applications.

At byBrick, we have worked with interactive 3D focused on industrial applications since 2006. The potential in interactively visualizing technical solutions has driven us to continuously develop new applications, lowering the barrier for sales staff when showing and explaining complex products or solutions.

Oculus Rift now adds a new dimension. With Virtual Reality technology, simulators become completely immersive. Instead of looking at a simulated world on computer screens you can now actually step into a simulated world.

This means that the customers of our customers can not only interact with the technical solution on screen, but also truly experience the size and power of a machine. Or why not actually move into a micro bead, to see how proteins bond to the bead in a separation process.

In one of our recent deliveries, we have helped our customer to introduce Oculus Rift based simulators in their training. Previously, they have relied on large motion platform simulators, where only one person at a time can get face time with the machine. The costs are very high, and traditional simulators are large and difficult to ship to a new location.

With the Oculus Rift adapted simulator, we did not only enable a better sense of depth (which improves realism for operator), but can now also multiply the number of simulators in use for a fraction of the cost of a large motion simulator. The shipping cost is close to zero, and technical support can be done remotely (as opposed to larger simulators, which require a specialized technician on site).

The first Oculus Rift training kit is now on trial, more have been ordered and a full rollout is around the corner. byBrick supply the kits, including all hardware and software, and develop the training material in an immersive 3D environment. We also provide full support worldwide, and can even update simulator units remotely over the Internet.

To summarize, the benefits are obvious:

- Trainees get more face time with the machine

- Trainers can educate more people at a lower cost

- Support and logistics can be done at a fraction of the cost for large simulators

- With same budget as for one large traditional simulator, you can have 50-100 Oculus Rift simulators, which in turn means that software investment in one training can get 50-100 more hours of training in simulators. 

For more information, contact Mathias Lewén (contact information here below).