UK’s Central Bedfordshire College Launches New Immersive Training Institute

A new immersive training facility and program, the Immersive Technology Institute (ITI), has been launched Luton, UK in a collaboration between Central Bedfordshire College (CBC) and AI and VR development firm AiSolve. The Institute will put VR and AR technologies in the hands of students in conjunction with education training software and content to create an interactive curriculum.

The Institute will teach students technical skills, and says the VR and AR tech will “allow colleges to work creatively with teachers, trainers and lecturers to reimagine their teaching approach, giving them more time to teach the social skills and techniques that are so vital within the workplace, for example, how to approach a certain situation or how to respond to a manager.”

CBC is a regional college of further education focusing on providing students with knowledge and skills pertinent to the domestic and international workforce. Recent investments of £4 million on a new Engineering and Technology Centre on the Leighton Blizzard campus and £15.5 million on the main campus (Dunstable) aim to provide state of the art facilities for students.

AiSolve is an immersive software development firm based in Luton, that apply their software across multiple business disciplines such as retail, leisure, education, and healthcare. Their area of specialization is in artificial intelligence driven VR and AR applications and content.

CEO of AiSolve, Devi Kolli, plans to head the Immersive Technology Institute initiative on her company’s behalf stating, “Virtual and mixed reality have finally reached a level of sophistication from both a hardware and software perspective. This translates to an ability to help educate and train students who will become the workforce of tomorrow.”

British AI Company AiSolve Buy Clay Park VR

Artificial Intelligence firm AiSolve have announced their expansion into North America with the purchase of American virtual reality (VR) company Clay Park VR.

Clay Park VR founder Shauna Heller will be president of the newly created AiSolve North america, which will developer AI as well as VR and mixed reality (MR) tools and applications and form relationships with other American and international businesses. AiSolve now has offices in Los Angeles, Glendale, CA and will shortly be opening a new office in Palo Alto, CA.

“When we founded the company in 2010 we were a team of four and few people were talking about artificial intelligence or its impact on tech and society,” said AiSolve CEO Devi Kolli, “Now, we’re 40 strong, operate two offices on two continents and have developed a suite of AI, VR and MR software solutions for education, enterprise and entertainment that we’re excited to introduce to the global market. The depth of Clay Park’s business and breadth of Shauna’s product knowledge give us a big advantage.”

Heller added: “Even before I launched Clay Park I’d watched AiSolve evolve from promising tech services group to robust software solutions developers with AI, VR and MR products that scale. Last year, when they spun out and sold their AR division, Ads Reality, I knew they’d matured to a point where large-scale growth was imminent so it’s exciting to now help shape and guide that process.”

VRFocus will continue to report on new developments in the VR sector.

September 6, 2017

AiSolve Acquires Clay Park VR, Installs Founder as Head of North American Operations

'Mayan Adventure' game for AiSolve's WePlayVR system

AI and VR development firm AiSolve has acquired Clay Park VR, an LA-based strategy and advisory consultancy headed by Oculus-alum Shauna Heller. Heller takes up the position of president of AiSolve’s newly formed North American operations.

The UK-base AiSolve was founded in 2010 and has grown to some 40 employees focusing on development of AI and VR tech and experiences. Among the company’s recent projects in the VR space is a virtual reality training pilot program for Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, and WePlayVR, a compact VR attraction for location-based venues.

Clay Park VR founder Shauna Heller worked previously as a Developer Relations Specialist at Oculus on the company’s Publishing and Content team where she focused primarily on curating non-gaming VR content for Gear VR. Heller founded Clay Park VR in 2016 to offer strategic advising for clients entering and navigating the VR sector. Among the projects she helped guide under Clay Park was the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles VR pilot program which brought together a portion of Heller’s network, including Facebook, Oculus, Bioflight VR, and AiSolve.

Starting in early 2016, the project sought to replace expensive and time consuming mannequin-based training, which costs the Hospital $430,000 annually, according to Dr. Todd Chang, as reported by VU Dream. The aim of the pilot program was to train staff using simulated trauma scenarios to ensure accurate assessment and decision making.

Following Heller’s work alongside AiSolve for the hospital pilot project, the company acquired Clay Park VR and is installing Heller as head of the company’s newly formed North American operations. The amount of the acquisition was not announced; the move appears primarily intended to pick up Heller’s business skills and foresight as a VR industry insider.

The WePlayVR system | Image courtesy AiSolve

On the entertainment end of the VR spectrum, AiSolve also develops and sells WePlayVR, a modular VR attraction for location-based venues, consisting of a unique playspace layout around which the company develops bespoke content, making use of the playspace to give players the feeling of being in even larger environments. The turn-key system also comes with an HTC Vive and VR backpack PC, and operates on an annual license model.

Heller will coordinate the company’s operations through CA offices in Los Angeles, Glendale, and Palo Alto, supporting partnership development and deployment of the WePlayVR system.

The post AiSolve Acquires Clay Park VR, Installs Founder as Head of North American Operations appeared first on Road to VR.

May 30, 2017

AiSolve Debuts its new Modular Location-Based VR Attraction WePlayVR

UK-based virtual reality (VR) content producer AiSolve has launched a new VR attraction to be installed in locations such as shopping centres, arcades, museums and science centres. The new VR platform is called WePlayVR and features a modular design for easier upgrading and maintenance.

The first VR experience to feature on the WePlayVR platform is titled Mayan Adventure, which has been developed exclusively by AiSolve to show off the capabilities of the WePlayVR system. Gameplay of Mayan Adventure involves players donning a HTC Vive headset to search an ancient Mayan Ruin for a golden monkey statue, which is being protected by a dangerous serpent god. The room-scale experience involves players exploring dark virtual tunnels and solving puzzles to discover the secrets of the ruin.

AiSolve designed WePlayVR to be a modular, plug-and-play system that will allow the system to be easily expanded from single player to multiplayer. 4D features such as wind, mist, heat and motion platform technology have also been incorporated into the system for a more immersive experience. The system uses AiSolve’s own in-house AI framework and analytics to capture user data to improve the experiences.

CEO Devi Kolli said in a statement: “What’s unique about the WePlayVR single-player product is the ROI and value experience it generates over a small occupancy of three-by-three square metres. Its clever modular design, with built-in motion floor, offers a comfortable and exciting experience that we’re very proud to offer to the market. Most of the visitors and non-gamers who try Mayan Adventure come back for a second experience and can’t seem to get enough of the thrill it offers. As seasoned virtual reality developers, we can’t ask for a better response to our attraction.”

WePlayVR is scheduled to go live very soon in various locations across the UK, Dubai and the US with more locations still in development.

VRFocus will bring you further new on WePlayVR once it becomes available.

May 13, 2017May 15, 2017

Krankenhaus in LA verwendet VR-Simulation für die Ausbildung zur Notfallversorgung

Das amerikanische Gesundheitssystem hat vielerlei Macken. Unter anderem leidet es unter staatlichen Budgetkürzungen, was sich auch auf die Ausbildung angehender Ärzte und anderem Personal auswirkt. Aus diesem Grund tat sich das Kinderkrankenhaus in Los Angeles mit Oculus und anderen VR-Unternehmen zusammen, um ein kostengünstiges Training zur Notfallversorgung innerhalb der Virtual Reality zu gestalten. Dieses Training wird zukünftig im Kinderkrankenhaus angewendet.

Virtuelles Training zur Notfallmedizin

Durch die Partnerschaft zwischen Facebook, dem englischen Unternehmen AiSolve, die sich auf AI in Virtual Reality spezialisierten, der VFX-Gruppe Bioflight VR und dem Kinderkrankenhaus in Los Angeles entstand dieses Projekt. In der Zusammenarbeit dieser Gruppierungen entsteht ein kostengünstiges und effektives Training für Ärzte, Krankenschwestern, Chirurgen und Mediziner. Diese tauchen in der Virtual Reality in realistisch simulierte Notfallszenarien ein, um dort ihr Handwerk zu verrichten.

VR-Training-Children-Hospital-Los-Angeles-Bioflight-VR-AiSolve-Oculus

Derzeit werden in der amerikanischen Ausbildung teure und zeitaufwendige Puppen für diese Zwecke hergestellt, die jedoch nach einiger Nutzung kaputt gehen. Das Kinderkrankenhaus in Los Angeles gab an für diese Ausbildungsform 430.000 US-Dollar pro Jahr ausgegeben zu haben.

Studien bestätigen Authentizität virtueller Szenarien

Diese Ausbildung soll nun mit einer Oculus Rift mit Touch Controllern durchgeführt werden. Die Vorteile liegen klar auf der Hand: Das Training wird schneller und einfacher durchgeführt und ist günstiger. Durch die Anwendung von AiSolve sollen die Patienten und die medizinischen Gehilfen in der virtuellen Realität wie im echten Leben reagieren. Das Kinderkrankenhaus führte dazu bereits Studien durch und bestätigen die Authentizität der virtuellen Szenarien. Zudem werden die Auszubildenden wie im echten Leben unter Zeitdruck und Anspannung gesetzt.

Diese Form der virtuellen Ausbildung ist etwas Besonderes und kann die Betroffenen besser auf zukünftige Notfallsituationen vorbereiten. Zudem ist sie günstiger und einfacher auszuführen. Das Projekt wurde Anfang 2016 gestartet, wurde mehrfach überarbeitet und verbessert, bis es im Jahr 2017 schließlich Anwendung fand. Selbstverständlich werden das Projekt und die Erfolge dauerhaft analysiert und weiter verbessert.

Wir dürfen gespannt sein, welche Resultate dabei herauskommen.

(Quelle: VRScout)

Der Beitrag Krankenhaus in LA verwendet VR-Simulation für die Ausbildung zur Notfallversorgung zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!

May 8, 2017

Children’s Hospital Los Angeles Using VR Training for Trauma Situations

The Children’s Hospital Los Angeles has revealed a collaboration with UK-based artificial intelligence (AI) specialist AiSolve, Bioflight VR, a Hollywood-based VFX specialist, and Oculus on a VR training system for emergency paediatric trauma situations.

The VR simulation aims to create a cost-effective, realistic and reliable training programme rather than using the traditional method of mannequins. These are normally quite expensive with the hospital spending around $430,000 USD annually to train staff on mannequins, it can also be very time-consuming.

Children’s Hospital Los Angeles image 1

So a team of programmers at AiSolve took a conceived medical environment and created an AI powered virtual world where students can make decisions and progress or re-evaluate their decisions based upon responses from the virtual patient, virtual medical staff and program. All the scenarios were developed from real case studies provided by the hospital’s doctors, fully realised in VR with multiple options, dialogue, possible events and a variety of events that may happen during a genuine paediatric emergency.

AiSolve CEO Devi Kolli said in a statement: “The aim of this is to prepare medical staff with the most realistic environment possible so that they experience the fast-moving, life-and-death, decision-making process multiple times and create strategies to make fast and accurate decisions for when children’s lives are in the balance. Through our collaboration with Oculus, Facebook and BioflightVR, we feel we’ve created the most realistic and immersive educational tool for healthcare providers that’s ever been developed.”

“On average we need one hour to prepare a 30 minute, mannequin-based simulation, and another 30 minutes to clean up,” according to Dr Todd Chang of the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. “Our organisation pays around $430,000 annually to train staff on mannequins, despite it being very time consuming as it’s the only best simulated training solution up until now.”

Dr Chang continued: “Experimental learning is among the best way to practice paediatric emergencies. We had a rather aggressive timetable and the VR simulation literally improved week by week. VR allows for the first-time experiential learning where not all the people are in the same room at the same time. It is far more flexible and students can perform the training far more often.”

Beginning in early 2016 a fully-working model was delivered in early 2017 and the development and medical teams will continue to monitor and enhance the virtual world as more users learn with it.

VRFocus will continue its coverage of medical VR, reporting back with the latest advancements.

April 28, 2017

The Virtual Arena: The Growing VR Out-of-Home Entertainment Dimension – Part 2

In the second part of his three-part feature, Kevin Williams continues his coverage of the development in the VR industries involvement in the Digital Out-of-Home Entertainment (DOE) sector. In this report looking at the American, Japanese and Dubai amusement trades interest in the technology. (You can find Part 1 here.)

Amusement & Attraction Embraces VR

Moving to the Western territories, and the American amusement trade had a major exhibition in Dallas during March; the Amusement Expo saw the usual gathering of traditional amusement pieces, but also new virtual reality (VR) investment. Previously mentioned Universal Sales (UNIS) also made the trip to the American event to show their OMNI Arena VR platform.

This was also held in partnership with the Laser Tag Convention, and one of the new VR systems being presented offers an approach likened to “VR Lasertag”, Zero Latency. The world’s first free-roaming, warehouse-scale, multiple player VR game arenas, (using VR back-packs to create the Arena-Scale experience). Currently successfully in operation on four continents, while seeking to announce its first signing in the UAE. And one of the first commercial versions of the Arena-Scale experience from the company was in Japan, installed in the SEGA JOYPOLIS facility.

Beyond the US shores, the Japanese amusement sector has started to invest in VR initiatives placing investment towards VR as a major component in future expansion. During February’s major Japanese amusement trade event, major corporation BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment revealed that following a VR experimental location, the company would be opening a new and larger version of their VR ZONE in Tokyo. The facility will again be a temportay operation (opening in April and closing in October 2017), the facility designed to house VR attractions specially created by BANDAI NAMCO building on their amusement development skills marrying the latest VR technology.

Other Japanese arcade operators such as TAITO and Capcom revealed that they would be installing the VR Game Stage, powered by HTC hardware. HTC supporting the use of consumer content able to be legally used in commercial entertainment venues through the Viveport Arcade commercial subscription platform for China, and currently on test in Europe and the USA. A similar solution is planned from Valve for SteamVR – while Oculus VR stays opposed to any commercial usage (not prepared at this point to pivot).

But the big development, missed by many in the media was the announcement and reveal of Koei Tecmo, launching their ‘VR Sense’, an experience capsule using a Sony PSVR headset and Move controller (powered by an internal Playstation 4 Pro system). This system was the advance guard on the major announcement that Sony Interactive Entertainment would be creating a specific division to roll out their PSVR platform into the location-based (out-of-home entertainment) sector in several territories. The ultimate example of the pivoting of the consumer approach to VR into the commercial entertainment arena.

Dubai Amusement and Leisure Industry VR Aspirations

Another territory that is embracing the opportunity of deploying DOE VR platforms is the United Arab Emirates (UAE) market, a sector that has seen an incredible investment in theme parks and leisure entertainment venues for their diverse audience. Taking place at the Dubai Entertainment, Amusement and Leisure (DEAL) expo recently, prominent amusement and attraction distributor in the UAE market, gathered the latest new developments to their booth. Veteran distributor and developer ASI showed the Holocube – the multiple enclosure VR game system using the HTC Vive and offering a unique gun interface experience (winner of the Silver Virtual Reality Game BOSA award 2017), and categorized as a “VR Enclosures” approach.

Also on the ASI booth was the WePlayVR system from developers AiSolve, running the VR Backpack experience called ‘The Mayan Adventure’. Also shown was the Yotto Group “VR Game Platform” EXOPLANE an immersive paraglider experience. At the Dubai exhibition, another major distributor in the territory supporting family entertainment center businesses is Warehouse of Games (WOG), the company had on their booth the local developer NUAT’s ‘The VR Cube’ another “VR Enclosures” approach. DEAL exhibitor FUNCO – Fun Entertainment Company, a prominent developer of turn-key solutions for operators wanting to open entertainment centers, partnered with Chinese VR Park developer LEKE VR, showing their full selection of “VR Game Platform” units that were seen foot-foot from the Chinese trade show premier.

Away from the major distributors, several standalone exhibitors showed VR aspirations. These included a “VR Ride Attraction” from Turkish developer AMEGA Entertainment – Cinecoaster 360 VR. This multi-directional motion XD cinema system using mobileVR headsets. Or exhibitor DOF Robotics who showed their HURRICANE 360 VR – a extreme motion platform system using mobileVR systems to represent the virtual experience, (the system a Bronze Virtual Reality Game BOSA award 2017).

Reflecting the interest in the territory to embrace VR in all its facets in the DOE sector, the local developer ImSim, demonstrated a 3DOF racing cockpit with force feedback and a power VR component. Many companies in the West have invested in motor sports network simulator (“Race Room”) ventures – and VR technology seen as a possible replacement to conventional flat screen visualization. American manufacturer CXC Simulations, is another name in this scene, having recently installed a “Race Room” at the Andretti Indoor Karking location in Marrietta. The venue running their latest CXC Motion Pro II VR system, the only VR simulator of its kind in commercial operation in the United States

Returning to the investment made in the UAE market, facilities such as the brand-new Hub Zero have added a major VR element to their interactive entertainment. The wireless multiplayer VR attraction was developed for the facility by VRStudio developer of the VRcade platform (winner of the Gold Virtual Reality Game BOSA award 2017). A leading global VR technology company, located in 11 countries, delivering the first truly wireless, full-range-of-motion, multi-participant, immersive experiences for commercial enterprises.

VRStudio has taken their wireless head-mounted experience into the realms of “VR Dark Ride”. Signing major theme park partnerships with Universal Orlando and most recently with Knott’s Berry Farm and parent company, Cedar Fair – towards opening in South California a specialized VR experience at the park.

The concluding feature covering recent developments in the UK, America and the interest from the Gaming industry on VR based Out-of-Home entertainment, follows shortly.