March 11, 2025 • 17 mins
In this episode, the AREA's Mark Sage chats with Deborah Kiefer of the School Engineering & Computer Science, at Oakland University in Rochester Hills, Michigan. They discuss the university's AR Center (ARC), where Deborah is the Project Manager. ARC focuses on research, education, and best practices in AR in business. Topics include:
- The origins and mission of the ARC, and the synergy between ARC and AREA. - Identifying new capabilities for AR, and weaving those into business strategies. - Trends and challenges that ARC has found in AR adoption, and recommendations for overcoming those challenges through education and training.
Please visit thearea.org.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:09):
Welcome to our OMG podcastseries. I'm Karen Quatromoni.
I'm Director of Public Relationsfor Object Management Group. At OMG,
we're known for driving industrystandards and building tech communities.
Today we're focusing on the AugmentedReality for Enterprise Alliance
and we have the executive director,
(00:29):
Mark Sage here who will leadthis podcast session. Mark?
Thank you, Karen. Thank you very much.And as Karen said, my name is Mark Sage,
the Augmented Reality for EnterpriseAlliance is a little bit of a mouthful,
so we often just refer to it asthe AREA. So if I mention the area,
this is the same thing.
(00:49):
So I'm really excitedto have our guest today.
I am going to ask her tointroduce yourself and tell
us a little bit about your organization.
Thank you for having me, Mark.I appreciate the opportunity.
My name is Deborah Kieferand I'm with the School of
Engineering and Computer Science atOakland University in Rochester, Michigan.
(01:14):
And in my role here,
I serve as the project managerfor the university's Augmented
Reality Center. And asyou just referred to,
with the area being a mouthful,
the Augmented Reality Centercan be a mouthful as well.
So we refer to it by its initials,
ARC and simply say "ARC".
(01:36):
So you'll hear me refer to it asARC throughout the conversation.
And a little bit about ARC,
we recognized about four years ago
that there was a need to helpcompanies in the area learn about
augmented reality and virtual reality.
(01:57):
It's recognized that it's going to beplaying a bigger and bigger role in
manufacturing.
And because Oakland Universityis situated in southeast Michigan
where there's just a verystrong manufacturing hub,
it just made sense for us to startlooking at this area and to start
(02:18):
becoming more of an advocate foraugmented reality and virtual
reality for their uses.We see our role as having
two main functions. One is, as I said,
to help companies learn aboutaugmented reality technology.
This will help them beinnovative, remain competitive,
(02:39):
and secondly,
as they do start to use thetechnologies they're going to need the
people that know how to developapplications to work with it,
to implement the solutions.And so in parallel,
we are working to create apipeline of their future workers.
It's a very big task, very big mission,
(03:02):
but we're not doing it on our own.
We have collaborated with a lot ofcompanies that have a vested interest in
using AR and vr, and wehave automotive companies,
we have equipment manufacturers,
robotics and automationcompanies, computer manufacturers,
as well as companies thatdevelop digital experiences.
(03:23):
So there's a whole host of expertise,
people with different expertisesthat come together for this center.
And so the idea is that we learn andgrow together and we work together
to find the best solutionsall in collaboration with one
another.And just finally,
(03:44):
one other very unique thing I'dlike to mention about our center is
that in addition toour corporate sponsors,
we collaborate with anothereducational institution.
That Institution is theCollege for Creative
Studies located here in Detroit,which is a world renowned,
(04:05):
very prestigious art and design school.
And the reason for that is because we allknow that there's a lot of tech behind
AR, VR, a lot of programming, engineering,
but it's inherently visual andit needs to be intuitive to the
user and that requires expertiseof people who have art and design
(04:26):
backgrounds, user experience backgrounds.
So we collaborate with the twoschools together to create educational
experiences and our students comeout with a blended skillset of, or at
least knowing what theother side requires.
An engineer knows how totalk to a designer and a designer knows how to talk to
(04:46):
an engineer.
Deborah, that's amazing.
And I love the idea of bringing all ofthese kind of skill sets and knowledge
together. It's reallyimportant. As you mentioned,
the kind of visual part of AR is crucial,but there's obviously content there,
the kind of technology andtechnical aspects as well.
(05:07):
So bringing all of these together issuper exciting and congratulations on
really understanding the scope of thetechnology and how you can help it.
So maybe I can ask you another question.
We're super excited thatyou are an area member.
So could you tell us a little bit of whythe university joined the area and what
(05:27):
you hope to achieve by the membership?
Yeah, well,
being a part of AREA is reallya nice compliment to what we're
doing at arc.
We're focused on a lotof the technical aspect,
our workforce development efforts.
We'll go into engineering and designof the application development.
(05:50):
And what we're trying to dois help companies think up
and realize new capabilitiesthrough use of AR technology,
how they can implementthat into their processes.
But having the capabilityis really just one piece.
There's a whole gamut of other thingsthat they need to consider if they
(06:13):
truly want to implement ARtechnology into their process.
And those are things like,is it safe for my workers?
How secure is it? Thecybersecurity is a big issue.
Am I going to get a return on myinvestment and privacy issues?
And these are business considerations.
(06:33):
That is what area delves into,that's where area excels.
So by being a member of area,
we can benefit from the accessto information that area
provides and learn about thosetopics that will help us be a better
center.
It will help us have greater awarenessas we grow and as we work with
(06:56):
faculty, as we work with companiesthat we think can benefit from area,
we can refer them to that organization.
Yeah, no, thank you Deborah. And that'ssome really good kind of insights.
And you're absolutely right. We oftentalk, and I know we've spoken about this,
the term pilot purgatory. Often companies,
(07:17):
they can do a great demonstration orkind of an early proof of concept,
but when they try to then extendthat into the wider organization,
they do come up with these barriers toadoption. So being able to work with you,
really understanding the kindof needs and what you're doing,
supporting them in allsorts of different ways,
this kind of extra layer of helpingthem understand some of the business
(07:41):
challenges preferably before oras they're starting their pilot
so they have a clear delivery path.
So once everybody's reallyexcited about the pilot,
they understand some of the challengesthey need to overcome to expand out to
the whole organization.
So I think it's a really great synergyand we're really looking forward and glad
(08:02):
that ARC is part of the area family.
Going on to the next question then wecan dive into this a little bit more
detail,
is what is your center's the ARCcenter's kind of mission and vision?
Well, as we touched on earlier,
the two main goals are to helpthe companies with AR adoption
(08:25):
and the workforce development.
But in terms of helpingcompanies in the industrial space
use this technology,
we have training programs thatwe offer so that their current
workforce can learn aboutthe softwares that are used,
learn how to startdeveloping an application,
(08:49):
and we have avenues for helpingthem start with one of those pilot
projects that you mentioned. All of thebusiness part is extremely important,
but they also have to know how to do it.
So we are working with companiesto hand in hand to walk
them through startingtheir own pilot projects.
(09:09):
And we also see ourselves asbeing kind of a meeting place,
a conduit where other companiescan connect with each other.
So as we all learn and grow,
maybe some company can help anothercompany and they can find their own
solution.
So we're kind of a matchmaker in somesense with these companies that want to
collaborate with us.
(09:33):
And that's really important.
We find that companies reallylearn from other experts,
share the knowledge, the best practice,
and it makes them more effective as well.
And when you kind of share thaton the whole ecosystem grows.
So that kind of collaborationbit is really important.
(09:55):
On a larger scale for how we
vision the future,
I think we just ARC wants to be a leader.
We want to be a leader to advance thistechnology in all kinds of ways and
to empower companies to empowercommunities to learn how to
(10:16):
integrate the technology so that theycan be more innovative to help with
education of people in general.
So we really want to be adriver behind the growth and
implementation of the technology.
And I'm already seeing great things.
So I think you've got a great start there.
(10:37):
Let's maybe go back onto the enterprise AR
implementation bit that we both mentioned,
but can you talk in a bit more detailabout the challenges that companies face
in deploying enterprise ar?
A lot of times they justdunno how to get started.
(10:57):
We often hear thequestions, how hard is it?
What skills do we need? Is it expensive?
How much does it cost?
So there's a lot of questions theyjust not sure how to get started.
So that is a barrier in itself,just having that, where do I start?
Kind of thoughts in their head.
(11:19):
So we try to help that through offeringeducational programs for them to learn
about the technology.
Some of the other challenges that theyface are that they have workers that are
just reluctant to try it orthey're apprehensive about using
something that's very new,something that's very unfamiliar,
(11:39):
particularly some ofthe older workforce is
just they've been doing things for manyyears that are working well and they
don't see the need to change.
So that can be kind of abarrier to implementing it,
just getting over that reluctanceand then sometimes the leadership's
just not on board. Wehear from companies that
(12:05):
there are some individuals thathave are very forward thinking,
but getting the buy-in from topleadership can be a challenge.
How does ARC help addressthe challenges you mentioned?
Well,
it all starts with educationand we're in the business
(12:25):
of education, so that's a good thing.
So as these companies aretrying to figure out how do I
get started,
we want to position our placeswhere they can learn and explore.
And one of the key ways that wedo that is we operate a publicly
open lab. So you can talk about thistechnology till you're blue in the face,
(12:49):
but until you put on the goggles ortest out the tablet or however you
want to experience it, untilyou see it for yourself,
it's really hard to understandby having this public
lab. Companies can comewith their customers,
individuals can come on their own,
students can come and they can tryout various headsets and technologies
(13:13):
and really get a sense of what augmentedreality and virtual reality are
all about. And when they do that,
then the wheels start to spin and theycan start to imagine new possibilities
and new solutions.So this lab is a really important piece
of our center and really helpspeople learn and explore the
(13:35):
technology.
We also offer seminars andtraining so industry and
academic leaders can learn more and the
academic people can share insights andother industry leaders can share their
insights. So we can alllearn from one another.
And so by taking thestep to educate yourself,
(14:00):
learn about it,
that will get companies to more of acomfort level where they're ready to take
the first steps. And so when they'reready to take the first steps,
we're there to help.
We can offer additional trainingon a granular level with
software developed software programs,
and we can also providethem project support.
(14:20):
So as they're working in their projects,
we have students and faculty and equipmentresources that they can access to
help them on their way.
That's great, thank you Deborah.Aside from joining the AREA,
what advice can you offer tocompanies starting in enterprise ai?
Take advantage of everyopportunity you can to learn.
(14:44):
You go to seminars or shows,try out the equipment.
If there's a lab in yourarea we offer that you
can visit and just experimentand get to know how
AR and VR work. Do it, justlearn about it, dive in.
And then when you're ready tomaybe think about doing a project,
(15:07):
start with something reallysmall and well-defined.
We tell companies thatare thinking about it,
that select a process or somethingthat's working right now at your company,
maybe it's some type oftraining program that you have
going. And then mirror that,
try to do it in a virtual way andthen compare the two methods and see
(15:32):
if it's working, see the benefitsand the challenges of each.
So as you do this, you cansee what the benefits are.
For example, in the training example,
was it just as effectiveand did it save time?
Is it a viable alternative to thein-person training when that in-person
(15:54):
training's not possible. Sojust start with something small,
try it out and see how it works.
And then inevitably fromthere more ideas will flow and
other projects andopportunities will take shape.
Fantastic. Yeah, thank youDeborah. And just adding onto that,
(16:15):
another something I oftenspeak to companies who are starting their journey is
to kind of plan big.
So make sure you get the differentparts of the organization involved.
You mentioned the kind of security andthe technical team, the safety teams,
the end users, the kind ofmanagement and stakeholders.
(16:35):
But actually when you start to implementsmall, so get these proof of concepts,
show the ROI get peopleactually using the solution and
providing feedback so you can updateit with real good feedback from
the actual users of it.
And that way you can kind of growthe solution and hopefully grow the
(16:57):
team and the capability as well.
Exactly. And that's really whatwe're trying to help companies do.
Fantastic. So Deborah, thank youvery much for those amazing insights.
Thank you for Oakland Universityand ARC and part of the area.
We're kind of excited to have you onboard and work together to really kind of
(17:20):
push in Michigan,
but all across the world andthe US the delivery of AR
solutions. So good luck andthank you for all your support.
Alright. We're happy to be part ofthe AREA too. Fantastic, thank you.
Welcome to our OMG podcastseries. I'm Karen Quatromoni.
I'm Director of Public Relationsfor Object Management Group. At OMG,
we're known for driving industrystandards and building tech communities.
Today we're focusing on the AugmentedReality for Enterprise Alliance
and we have the executive director,
(00:29):
Mark Sage here who will leadthis podcast session. Mark?
Thank you, Karen. Thank you very much.And as Karen said, my name is Mark Sage,
the Augmented Reality for EnterpriseAlliance is a little bit of a mouthful,
so we often just refer to it asthe AREA. So if I mention the area,
this is the same thing.
(00:49):
So I'm really excitedto have our guest today.
I am going to ask her tointroduce yourself and tell
us a little bit about your organization.
Thank you for having me, Mark.I appreciate the opportunity.
My name is Deborah Kieferand I'm with the School of
Engineering and Computer Science atOakland University in Rochester, Michigan.
(01:14):
And in my role here,
I serve as the project managerfor the university's Augmented
Reality Center. And asyou just referred to,
with the area being a mouthful,
the Augmented Reality Centercan be a mouthful as well.
So we refer to it by its initials,
ARC and simply say "ARC".
(01:36):
So you'll hear me refer to it asARC throughout the conversation.
And a little bit about ARC,
we recognized about four years ago
that there was a need to helpcompanies in the area learn about
augmented reality and virtual reality.
(01:57):
It's recognized that it's going to beplaying a bigger and bigger role in
manufacturing.
And because Oakland Universityis situated in southeast Michigan
where there's just a verystrong manufacturing hub,
it just made sense for us to startlooking at this area and to start
(02:18):
becoming more of an advocate foraugmented reality and virtual
reality for their uses.We see our role as having
two main functions. One is, as I said,
to help companies learn aboutaugmented reality technology.
This will help them beinnovative, remain competitive,
(02:39):
and secondly,
as they do start to use thetechnologies they're going to need the
people that know how to developapplications to work with it,
to implement the solutions.And so in parallel,
we are working to create apipeline of their future workers.
It's a very big task, very big mission,
(03:02):
but we're not doing it on our own.
We have collaborated with a lot ofcompanies that have a vested interest in
using AR and vr, and wehave automotive companies,
we have equipment manufacturers,
robotics and automationcompanies, computer manufacturers,
as well as companies thatdevelop digital experiences.
(03:23):
So there's a whole host of expertise,
people with different expertisesthat come together for this center.
And so the idea is that we learn andgrow together and we work together
to find the best solutionsall in collaboration with one
another.And just finally,
(03:44):
one other very unique thing I'dlike to mention about our center is
that in addition toour corporate sponsors,
we collaborate with anothereducational institution.
That Institution is theCollege for Creative
Studies located here in Detroit,which is a world renowned,
(04:05):
very prestigious art and design school.
And the reason for that is because we allknow that there's a lot of tech behind
AR, VR, a lot of programming, engineering,
but it's inherently visual andit needs to be intuitive to the
user and that requires expertiseof people who have art and design
(04:26):
backgrounds, user experience backgrounds.
So we collaborate with the twoschools together to create educational
experiences and our students comeout with a blended skillset of, or at
least knowing what theother side requires.
An engineer knows how totalk to a designer and a designer knows how to talk to
(04:46):
an engineer.
Deborah, that's amazing.
And I love the idea of bringing all ofthese kind of skill sets and knowledge
together. It's reallyimportant. As you mentioned,
the kind of visual part of AR is crucial,but there's obviously content there,
the kind of technology andtechnical aspects as well.
(05:07):
So bringing all of these together issuper exciting and congratulations on
really understanding the scope of thetechnology and how you can help it.
So maybe I can ask you another question.
We're super excited thatyou are an area member.
So could you tell us a little bit of whythe university joined the area and what
(05:27):
you hope to achieve by the membership?
Yeah, well,
being a part of AREA is reallya nice compliment to what we're
doing at arc.
We're focused on a lotof the technical aspect,
our workforce development efforts.
We'll go into engineering and designof the application development.
(05:50):
And what we're trying to dois help companies think up
and realize new capabilitiesthrough use of AR technology,
how they can implementthat into their processes.
But having the capabilityis really just one piece.
There's a whole gamut of other thingsthat they need to consider if they
(06:13):
truly want to implement ARtechnology into their process.
And those are things like,is it safe for my workers?
How secure is it? Thecybersecurity is a big issue.
Am I going to get a return on myinvestment and privacy issues?
And these are business considerations.
(06:33):
That is what area delves into,that's where area excels.
So by being a member of area,
we can benefit from the accessto information that area
provides and learn about thosetopics that will help us be a better
center.
It will help us have greater awarenessas we grow and as we work with
(06:56):
faculty, as we work with companiesthat we think can benefit from area,
we can refer them to that organization.
Yeah, no, thank you Deborah. And that'ssome really good kind of insights.
And you're absolutely right. We oftentalk, and I know we've spoken about this,
the term pilot purgatory. Often companies,
(07:17):
they can do a great demonstration orkind of an early proof of concept,
but when they try to then extendthat into the wider organization,
they do come up with these barriers toadoption. So being able to work with you,
really understanding the kindof needs and what you're doing,
supporting them in allsorts of different ways,
this kind of extra layer of helpingthem understand some of the business
(07:41):
challenges preferably before oras they're starting their pilot
so they have a clear delivery path.
So once everybody's reallyexcited about the pilot,
they understand some of the challengesthey need to overcome to expand out to
the whole organization.
So I think it's a really great synergyand we're really looking forward and glad
(08:02):
that ARC is part of the area family.
Going on to the next question then wecan dive into this a little bit more
detail,
is what is your center's the ARCcenter's kind of mission and vision?
Well, as we touched on earlier,
the two main goals are to helpthe companies with AR adoption
(08:25):
and the workforce development.
But in terms of helpingcompanies in the industrial space
use this technology,
we have training programs thatwe offer so that their current
workforce can learn aboutthe softwares that are used,
learn how to startdeveloping an application,
(08:49):
and we have avenues for helpingthem start with one of those pilot
projects that you mentioned. All of thebusiness part is extremely important,
but they also have to know how to do it.
So we are working with companiesto hand in hand to walk
them through startingtheir own pilot projects.
(09:09):
And we also see ourselves asbeing kind of a meeting place,
a conduit where other companiescan connect with each other.
So as we all learn and grow,
maybe some company can help anothercompany and they can find their own
solution.
So we're kind of a matchmaker in somesense with these companies that want to
collaborate with us.
(09:33):
And that's really important.
We find that companies reallylearn from other experts,
share the knowledge, the best practice,
and it makes them more effective as well.
And when you kind of share thaton the whole ecosystem grows.
So that kind of collaborationbit is really important.
(09:55):
On a larger scale for how we
vision the future,
I think we just ARC wants to be a leader.
We want to be a leader to advance thistechnology in all kinds of ways and
to empower companies to empowercommunities to learn how to
(10:16):
integrate the technology so that theycan be more innovative to help with
education of people in general.
So we really want to be adriver behind the growth and
implementation of the technology.
And I'm already seeing great things.
So I think you've got a great start there.
(10:37):
Let's maybe go back onto the enterprise AR
implementation bit that we both mentioned,
but can you talk in a bit more detailabout the challenges that companies face
in deploying enterprise ar?
A lot of times they justdunno how to get started.
(10:57):
We often hear thequestions, how hard is it?
What skills do we need? Is it expensive?
How much does it cost?
So there's a lot of questions theyjust not sure how to get started.
So that is a barrier in itself,just having that, where do I start?
Kind of thoughts in their head.
(11:19):
So we try to help that through offeringeducational programs for them to learn
about the technology.
Some of the other challenges that theyface are that they have workers that are
just reluctant to try it orthey're apprehensive about using
something that's very new,something that's very unfamiliar,
(11:39):
particularly some ofthe older workforce is
just they've been doing things for manyyears that are working well and they
don't see the need to change.
So that can be kind of abarrier to implementing it,
just getting over that reluctanceand then sometimes the leadership's
just not on board. Wehear from companies that
(12:05):
there are some individuals thathave are very forward thinking,
but getting the buy-in from topleadership can be a challenge.
How does ARC help addressthe challenges you mentioned?
Well,
it all starts with educationand we're in the business
(12:25):
of education, so that's a good thing.
So as these companies aretrying to figure out how do I
get started,
we want to position our placeswhere they can learn and explore.
And one of the key ways that wedo that is we operate a publicly
open lab. So you can talk about thistechnology till you're blue in the face,
(12:49):
but until you put on the goggles ortest out the tablet or however you
want to experience it, untilyou see it for yourself,
it's really hard to understandby having this public
lab. Companies can comewith their customers,
individuals can come on their own,
students can come and they can tryout various headsets and technologies
(13:13):
and really get a sense of what augmentedreality and virtual reality are
all about. And when they do that,
then the wheels start to spin and theycan start to imagine new possibilities
and new solutions.So this lab is a really important piece
of our center and really helpspeople learn and explore the
(13:35):
technology.
We also offer seminars andtraining so industry and
academic leaders can learn more and the
academic people can share insights andother industry leaders can share their
insights. So we can alllearn from one another.
And so by taking thestep to educate yourself,
(14:00):
learn about it,
that will get companies to more of acomfort level where they're ready to take
the first steps. And so when they'reready to take the first steps,
we're there to help.
We can offer additional trainingon a granular level with
software developed software programs,
and we can also providethem project support.
(14:20):
So as they're working in their projects,
we have students and faculty and equipmentresources that they can access to
help them on their way.
That's great, thank you Deborah.Aside from joining the AREA,
what advice can you offer tocompanies starting in enterprise ai?
Take advantage of everyopportunity you can to learn.
(14:44):
You go to seminars or shows,try out the equipment.
If there's a lab in yourarea we offer that you
can visit and just experimentand get to know how
AR and VR work. Do it, justlearn about it, dive in.
And then when you're ready tomaybe think about doing a project,
(15:07):
start with something reallysmall and well-defined.
We tell companies thatare thinking about it,
that select a process or somethingthat's working right now at your company,
maybe it's some type oftraining program that you have
going. And then mirror that,
try to do it in a virtual way andthen compare the two methods and see
(15:32):
if it's working, see the benefitsand the challenges of each.
So as you do this, you cansee what the benefits are.
For example, in the training example,
was it just as effectiveand did it save time?
Is it a viable alternative to thein-person training when that in-person
(15:54):
training's not possible. Sojust start with something small,
try it out and see how it works.
And then inevitably fromthere more ideas will flow and
other projects andopportunities will take shape.
Fantastic. Yeah, thank youDeborah. And just adding onto that,
(16:15):
another something I oftenspeak to companies who are starting their journey is
to kind of plan big.
So make sure you get the differentparts of the organization involved.
You mentioned the kind of security andthe technical team, the safety teams,
the end users, the kind ofmanagement and stakeholders.
(16:35):
But actually when you start to implementsmall, so get these proof of concepts,
show the ROI get peopleactually using the solution and
providing feedback so you can updateit with real good feedback from
the actual users of it.
And that way you can kind of growthe solution and hopefully grow the
(16:57):
team and the capability as well.
Exactly. And that's really whatwe're trying to help companies do.
Fantastic. So Deborah, thank youvery much for those amazing insights.
Thank you for Oakland Universityand ARC and part of the area.
We're kind of excited to have you onboard and work together to really kind of
(17:20):
push in Michigan,
but all across the world andthe US the delivery of AR
solutions. So good luck andthank you for all your support.
Alright. We're happy to be part ofthe AREA too. Fantastic, thank you.
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On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!