Why VR for Work and Why Now?

Many organisations are now moving from “should and might” explore virtual reality to “can and must” use VR in order to get ahead of the pack.

In fact, we are actually seeing pilots happen within weeks rather than months, as these pioneering organisations see the use of VR as a major competitive advantage.

Therefore in this article, we will explore why “VR for Work” is accelerating and how it can impact the bottom line in your organisation.

Signals of Change

Modern organisations are now global organisations. With this, we see an ever-increasing focus on shared projects and location-less work. The growth in distributed teams and the infrastructure to allow this is exploding and shows no sign of slowing down. Companies such as Github and Automatic are leaders in the field.

Business Continuity

Organisations brace for impacts on how the global workforce operates today. This has moved from a “nice-to-have” to a “must-have” with current global events slowing down trade in 2020.

Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG)

Sustainability impacts the bottom line. There is a connected message from the consumer to the enterprise – change or die.

Work-life Balance

Talent today demands balance. It now incorporates not only how employees work, but when and where employees work.

Travel and Expenses

Global business travel spending will reach over $1.7 trillion by 2020. Innovation teams and process leaders are under pressure to reduce this budget.

Readiness to Use Immersive Technology

Enterprise VR expenditure is projected to reach $4.26 Billion by 2023. For enterprise, it has moved from a technology that teams can test to a solution that organisations can plan to adopt.

Real-world Examples

Using holographic data on the job site, workers can review 3D models overlaid directly on a physical environment. — TRIMBLE

Ford developed its own Ford immersive Vehicle Environment (“FiVE”) system back in 2012, and has seen usage grow 50% annually ever since. Over 10,000 staff used it in 2017. — Tim Merel, Venturebeat

Virtual Meeting Rooms

The adoption of virtual meeting rooms for group collaboration is moving faster than last year. These early pilots have paved the wave for the next generation of deployment.

VR for Work in 2020

Virtual reality will play a larger part in this growing trend of working from anywhere. A mix of adoption, use cases and build-up of internal political capital means we’re moving from the 10s to the 100s of teams using these kinds of solutions every day.

Telepresence will happen very slowly, and then all at once, dramatically disrupting not only the conferencing business but business management and collaboration itself. — Charlie Fink, Forbes