Use of Mixed Reality in product presentation at Semperit

This use case aims to attach information in the form of text, images, or sketches to real-world objects using "virtual pins." The goal is to enable all employees in an industrial production facility to easily and contactlessly mark maintenance needs or anomalies on a machine using their smartphones. The generated notes are accessible to all employees across platforms via smartphone or AR glasses and are displayed in the same location for all users. This facilitates efficient communication between production and maintenance staff, allowing problems to be marked and described directly and continuously on-site.

The app was developed using the cross-platform augmented reality framework "Azure Spatial Anchors." This framework allows users to place anchors in space that maintain their position even if their surroundings change slightly. The anchor points are stored in the Azure cloud to ensure they can be found across devices. However, no images are sent to Microsoft; only arrangements of "feature points" are transmitted. These technologies enable the optical recognition of the environment without revealing the actual image. The actual information generated for each anchor point can be stored internally to minimize data privacy concerns.

The overall project, "Mixed Reality Based Collaboration 4 Industry," resulted from the collaboration of 22 companies and five scientific institutions from Lower Austria, Vienna, and Upper Austria (St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences, Upper Austria University of Applied Sciences Steyr Campus, FOTEC, IMC University of Applied Sciences Krems, and Vienna University of Technology).