AR cloud technology enables the unification of the physical and digital worlds to create immersive experiences. In this technology, a common interface is used to deliver persistent, collaborative and contextual digital content overlaid onto people, objects and locations. This provides users with information and services directly tied to every aspect of their physical surroundings.

Gartner predicts that by 2025, 15% of the organizations with more than $1 billion in revenue will use AR cloud to monetise the physical world through new interactions and business models. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic has made the value proposition for enterprise AR solutions more urgent, mainly because it made their job their job not only easier and faster but also safer. Many organizations that already have AR deployed are expanding their deployments and to prepare for future AR cloud opportunities, technology leaders must also focus on building out the features, functionality and ecosystem required to make these applications more valuable and scalable.

The future of AR cloud applications

One of the hurdles to the AR adoption is the lack of scalable, off the shelf solutions. AR cloud experiences will amplify these hurdles and by many orders of magnitude by the nature of needing scalability while being persistent, collaborative and ubiquitous. While AR cloud tech is still far from main stream, there are a few early adaptions – Apple’s App Clips and Google Lens are a few examples. Although these are good examples, they are relatively isolated experienced and are collaborative, they exist independently of each other and are not part of a comprehensive experience. AR experiences are being applied to both consumers as well as employee experiences. Many of the technologies need to enable immersive and interactive AR experiences such as 5G, edge AI and IoT. It is also a known fact that the current generation of AR devices fall short on usability. Most AR experiences today require the use of tablets and smartphones which are not hands free and those which are – like head mounted displays are inaccessible due to cost, style and ergonomics.

Now is the time to explore AR cloud

Across history, companies have adopted technology for various reasons – some invested in technology for a competitive differentiator, for thought leadership or even for the fear of missing out. Yet, regardless of the initial intent, these technology adoptions have created a strong standing for those companies. With AR cloud too early adopters will surely have a win over those who don’t.

While the opportunities for investing in AR cloud can be exciting, they can also be daunting. It won’t be long however, when this technology becomes more mature and widely used in all walks of business.