Augmented reality (AR) is a disruptive innovation that is entering many, if not all, industries globally. Many apps as well as AR glasses and headsets are already marketed commercially and thus available to the individual customer. For individuals, this is mostly just for fun, such as the famous Pokémon Go app. On top of that, AR can sometimes already be useful in professional industries. It is, for example, increasingly being applied in the healthcare industry and it is expected to continuously transform this industry in the future.
Now, AR has touched a new industry: the army. Multiple companies, amongst which Microsoft and Magic Leap, are said to be willing to give AR-headsets to the United States army. By using these AR-headsets in the US army, they can be used for combat training, which will aid in optimizing the trainings. With the program, the US army says it is intending to become more effective: enemies should more quickly be recognized, and the army’s readiness to act should be increased as well. They are intending to gain an edge on the battlefield by incorporating these AR headsets in their trainings. The collaboration may eventually lead to providing over 100,000 headsets to the US army and the agreement would be part of a program worth over 500 million US dollars. (Brustein, 2018)
If this collaboration indeed continues, a whole new area of technology should be developed: the headsets should be made compatible with new sorts of environments, which may vary from the jungle, to the arctic, or the desert. Currently, the AR headsets that are marketed commercially to individuals, still have their bugs and are far from optimized yet. Therefore, one may wonder whether technology is ready to take on such a challenge. What do you think? Should they wait until technology is more ready for this challenge, or should they take the risk?
Reference:
Brustein, J. (2018). Magic Leap is Bidding on an Army Combat Contract. Retrieved September 23, 2018, from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-21/magic-leap-is-bidding-on-an-army-combat-contract?srnd=technology-vp
