The 2nd Annual VR/AR Global Summit at the Parq Vancouver, from November 1-2, 2019, featured some of the leading brands in the broader XR space, including Apple, Lenovo, Viacom, Niantic, and Microsoft, among others. A diverse array of use cases and new solutions for VR training were demonstrated throughout the event. The event, produced by the VR/AR Association, showcased a solid representation from local Vancouver firms, validating Vancouver’s status as the leading visual effects and animation cluster in the world, a growing presence in the broader XR arena.

I produced and moderated a packed house for the ‘Expert Storytelling in XR’ panel on Day 2 of the event, November 2nd, featuring Srinivas Krishna, founder/CEO, Geogram; Michael Owen, CEO, MediaCombo, and Amy Lou Abernethy, President, Creative Director, and Chief Learning Strategist at AMP Creative. Srinivas showed off his latest technology for virtual event production and promotion; Michael showed off his work in AR museum curation, and Amy Lou showed off AMP Creative’s work in VR empathy training.

Michael Owens, Srinivas Krishna, Amy Lou Abernethy, and Chris Pfaff, after the ‘Expert Storytelling in XR’ panel, November 2, 2019

Chris Pfaff, Srinivas Krishna, Michael Owen, and Amy Lou Abernethy, at the opening reception for the VR/AR Global Summit, October 31, 2019

Kris Kolo, executive director of VRARA, Chris Pfaff, and Michael Owen, at the opening reception for the VR/AR Global Summit, October 31, 2019

Chris Pfaff, Alan Smithson, and Michael Owen, at the opening reception for the VR/AR Global Summit, October 31, 2019

Alan Smithson discusses MetaVRse’s latest ed-tech work, while Sophia Loren looks on

Galit Ariel and Chris Pfaff, after Galit’s presentation, November 1, 2019

Group shot of attendees at the Vancouver Economic Commission’s VIP Dinner, at the Hawksworth Restaurant, November 1, 2019

The Augmented World Expo (AWE) Expo Europe conference, held at the MOC Exhibition Center in Munich on October 17-18, 2019 was an intense assemblage of leading enterprise solutions experts from some of Europe’s most prominent industrial companies, from Deutsche Telekom to Alstom and Siemens. A strong showing from the Finnish VR/AR scene – including Varjo, Glue, Dispelix, and Immersal – and a diverse showing of German industrial XR solutions proved that Northern Europe is well-positioned to lead innovation in the XR space in the new decade.

I chaired Day 2 of the Enterprise Track, on Friday, October 18th, and had an incredibly strong line-up of presenters. All but one showed up; Citrix’s Christian Reilly (who was slated to lead off the afternoon sessions with a talk entitled ‘Future of Work: The Next Technological Revolution’) was a no-show, but I managed to conduct a one-on-one stand-up chat with one of his competitors – Matt Copping, director of AR/VR at VMware. Dirk Hartmann, from Siemens, did not show, but his colleague, Theodoros Papadopoulos, presented solo. Daniel Seidl, from Innoactive, showed a QR code on his presentation, and got more than 20 leads in one minute. Megan Lubaszka, from Gensler, had a packed house, as did Nestle’s Richard Hess, and the last presentation of day, from heavyweight Alstom, saw presenter Aurelie Perruchon swamped with audience members pitching her after the track’s sessions ended.

Presenters included:

• Panagiotis-Alexandros Bokaris, L’Oreal: Video-projected Augmented Reality in the Beauty Industry
• Jana Gerl, Vuframe GmbH, Virtual & Augmented Business: How to Discover and Leverage Immersive Data You Already Onw
• Richard Hess, Nestle, Scaling XR at Nestle
• Daniel Seidl, Innovative: Challenges and Best Practices in Adopting and Scaling VR Training in Enterprise
• Barbara Schiavi, VINCI Construction France: Use Case: Construction Use Cases for AR and VR
• Megan Lubaszka, Gensler: AR, VR, AI and the Future of Spatial Computing
• Mattias Johansson, Tetra Pak: Automation Today and in Tetra Pak’s Factory of the Future
• Theodoros Papadopoulos, Siemens AG: Design Concept in VR – Democratizing Simulation World
• Gary Smith, Dwr Cymru Welsh Water: MR in Industry – Risk Reduction or Risk Generation
• Eletheria Kouri, ABI Research: An Accurate ROI Story: Identifying Impactful Variables in AR/VR Implementations
• Aurelie Perruchon, Alstom: AR/VR Use Cassetin Alstom

#AWE2019 #AugmentedReality #VirtualReality  www.awexr.com/eu-2019/www.awexr.com

Chris Pfaff, chairing the Enterprise Track on Day 2 of the Augmented World Expo (AWE) Europe, in Munich, October 18, 2019

Chris Pfaff, chair of Day 2 of the Enterprise Track, at the standee for Augmented World Expo (AWE) Europe, in Munich, October 18, 2019

Richard Hess, from Nestle, discusses XR use cases for the brand

Megan Lubaszka, from Gensler, discusses the future of spatial computing

Daniel Seidl, from Innoactive, discusses VR training for the enterprise

Chris Pfaff and Panagiotis-Alexandros Bokaris, from L’Oreal, at the start of Day 2 of the AWE Europe Enterprise Track, October 18, 2019

Chris Pfaff and Philip Wogart, executive director, DACH, at the VR/AR Association (VRARA), at a VRARA dinner on October 17, 2019

Chris Pfaff and Wade Tinney, chief product officer of Patched Reality, on Day 2 of AWE Europe, October 18, 2019

Chris Pfaff, Brian Kane, from Magic Leap, and Leif Arne Petersen, CEO/founder of HOLOGATE, at the Hologate headquarters, October 18, 2019

The winners of the AWE Europe Awards, onstage at the closing awards ceremony, October 18, 2019

As co-chair of the VR AR Association (http://www.thevrara.com), or VRARA Storytelling Committee, I had the opportunity to moderate a well-attended webinar on ‘VR & AR in Storytelling’ on Thursday, July 18, 2019, from 2:00-3:00 pm EST.

The session featured the following presenters:

Maarten van der Lee, Tiledmedia

Jeff Olm, Perfect Pictures

Tim Martin, FS Studio

Cortney Harding, Friends with Holograms

David Rodriguez, Zanni

Srinivas Krishna, Geogram

Michael Owen, MediaCombo

The webinar, part of the VRARA industry education series, was sponsored by the sponsored by the Storytelling Committee of VRARA.

You can access the full event recording at: https://www.brighttalk.com/webcast/14711/362982?

The third anniversary of the VR/AR Association (VRARA) New York chapter was a positive snapshot on the growth of the immersive/XR industry in the greater New York area in the past few years. The event was hosted on Tuesday evening, May 21^st, at RLAB (https://www.rlab.nyc), the massive space that NYU and its academic and City of New York partners opened in late-November, 2018. RLAB hosts several companies, including members of its XR Beta program, and is being built out as a larger facility for immersive innovation, including volumetric capture space.

Dex Yee (left), from VRARA, watches as Jason T. Jaslow signs in the VRARA NY 3rd anniversary

Chris Pfaff, VRARA NY Chaper advisor, welcomes the crowd at RLAB

As VRARA has grown globally, so too has its New York chapter, and this mirrors the broader focus on the XR industry in New York, which embraces enterprise and consumer firms alike.

Banu Ozden in discussion with Janice Brown, manager, education and outreach at RLAB

Robin White Owen and Michael Owen, the first XR couple of Brooklyn, at Rlab

Unseen Media demos its soon-to-be-released narrative AR game

Gur Arie Bittan, from Mantis Vision, demos for Banu Ozden and Jeffrey Ginsberg

More than 50 guests attended the mixer event, which featured demos from XR Beta companies, as well as Mantis Vision (http://mantis-vision.com), and remarks by RLAB’s Alexis Seeley and VRARA New York chapter advisor Chris Pfaff. And, of course, numerous demos of mobile AR experiences were shown by VRARA members as well.

Robin White Owen and Michael Owen listen to Tim Meyer, from IBM’s IoT group

Alexis Seeley, director of education and opportunity programs at Rlab, welcomes the crowd

Mantis Vision’s mo-cap installation, and some of its forthcoming collaboration tools, were a major hit at the event. Unseen Media ((https://www.unseenmedia.io), a narrative AR game developer, demonstrated its soon-to-be-released game, while echoAR (https://www.echoar.xyz), and AR-focused CMS and CDN provider, and SIY (Speak it Yourself – https://www.siyvr.com), a VR-based language instruction firm, demonstrated their solutions as well.

Chris Pfaff and Gordon Meyer, one of the Top 5 AR influencers in the industry

Chris Pfaff and Kate Specter, from Toonpack, at Rlab

Alexis Seeley and Janice Brown, with Rlab, prior to the VRARA event