Industry executives and experts share their predictions for 2021. Read them in this 13th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.
Businesses to Accelerate Remote Connectivity Infrastructure in 2021 with Focus on Wearables, AI and AR
By Dr. Hendrik Witt, Executive Vice President Augmented Reality at TeamViewer
During the pandemic, businesses moved quickly to modernize
their remote connectivity infrastructure. In 2021, we're going to see further
refinements, as well as innovations with AR, smart glasses and other
technologies that will also transform consumer adoption.
- Collaboration
technologies will continue to evolve and scale - When the pandemic struck,
the companies that had invested in innovation were better positioned to
manage through the disruption. They had the technology in place to manage
a remote, work-from-home shift and could keep their businesses running
effectively. Businesses with less mature infrastructure in place made
smart investments to modernize. Issues such as privacy and GDPR compliance
were complicating factors prior to the pandemic by addressed quickly in
order to keep businesses moving. In the year ahead, we're going to see
businesses reassess and re-evaluate their remote infrastructure to further
refine and scale their capabilities to meet new challenges and adjust to a
new normal.
- The Speed of Innovation
will Accelerate - The Pandemic continues to change how businesses deal
with introducing new technology. While there used to be a sense that
everything needed to be perfect before introducing new technology. Now,
businesses are under pressure to move more quickly to deploy technology
for a shorter time to impact. They need to get the benefits of the
technology sooner.
- Wearable technology will
boost front line worker productivity - Every industry was impacted
differently by the pandemic, but the technologies put in place to manage
the disruption will continue to transform basic work functions in the
years ahead. Automakers, for example, were struggling even before the
pandemic with engineering and manufacturing challenges and a need for
modernization. The challenges of keeping front line workers safe made it
difficult to maintain manufacturing operations - and these disruptions
were felt throughout the supply chain. This also impacted the retail and
logistics space. In response, many businesses began to embrace all sorts
of wearable technologies, including Smart Glasses, to keep workers
connected, informed and safe. This has driven significant productivity and
will continue to do so.
- Businesses will look to
collaboration technology for onboarding and training remote employees - As
business expect the effects of the pandemic to extend well into 2021, they
will explore ways to use connectivity solutions to train and onboard new
employees, and also to train existing employees on new systems put in
place during the pandemic. There are all sorts of solutions that are well
positioned for this use case, acting as a guidance system that walks
employees through everything they have to know.
- Businesses look to a
‘hybrid' working model - Businesses that have created a foundation to work
remotely are looking to apply that to a hybrid model in 2021 with some
employees in the office and others remote. As a result, we're going to see
some changes to product features to help take into account this situation.
The fundamental infrastructure that powers remote connectivity is very
well suited to manage a hybrid work environment, but we will see some new
innovations and features tailored to this use case in the year ahead.
- Smart glasses, AR ‘took
off' during the pandemic and will continue to make an impact - Smart
glasses got a significant push through the pandemic. People have accepted
this as a new piece of technology as a wearable tools that frees up hands
and helps employees get their jobs done. This is something that's here to
stay and it will continue to be adopted and refined in 2021. The same
holds true for the augmented reality (AR) paradigm, which helps provide
work instructions and connectivity. When businesses need specialized
knowledge and expertise onsite, they can look to AR as a way to tap the
knowledge and expertise of a professional in another location.
- Enterprise advancements
will impact consumer adoption - With all of the technology advancements in
the enterprise, we're seeing a mindset shift that will also be reflected
on the consumer side. As this continues to happen, people will feel more
comfortable in their private lives to also explore augmented reality,
smart glasses and other innovations to stay connected. This may include
more widespread adoption of these technologies for trouble shooting issues
within the home, especially as technicians are not always able to be
onsite.
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About the Author
Hendrik joined TeamViewer as a result of TeamViewer's
acquisition of the AR specialist Ubimax and is responsible for driving product
development in the AR field.
Hendrik is one of the three founders of Ubimax. With more
than 15 years of professional experience in the areas of innovation, software
technology, and strategy development, Hendrik was responsible for corporate
strategy and product development as CEO of Ubimax. His immense contribution
transformed Ubimax into the world market leader for industrial augmented
reality solutions. Before founding Ubimax, he worked for many years as a
strategy consultant for Arthur D. Little and as a technology and innovation
consultant for TZI in Bremen.
Hendrik holds a PhD in computer science from the University
of Bremen and the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, USA.