Case study:

Siemens OEE Virtual Academy

Background

Siemens, the multinational tech company, wanted to visualise and explain Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) software tools to customers in a clear and easily understood manner. They were looking towards a communication solution that would:

• Visualise how Siemens software improves OEE

• Allow people to interact

• Conduct remote, virtual sales meetings

Avatar Academy allows our customers
to join us for an immersive overview of
our services regardless of their
geographic location. This has greatly
increased the efficiency of our sales
activities across Europe.

-Carl Murphy, Project Owner, Siemens

https://youtu.be/h-r72Je2Y5A

Approach

Over 16 weeks, the team produced a virtual
reality experience that showcased how Siemens’
software tracks the OEE of a particular machine.
This solution allows a host to guide the
experience for multiple guests. A sales person
could share the experience with customers, all
interacting with and seeing the same
visualisation. Each user is represented in the
virtual experience by their own personal avatar,
facilitating natural communication between all
participants.

Application Design

Siemens’ brief was used as the blueprint for a
narrative document which detailed the
visualisation and the actions available to
participants. A design document with concept
art, storyboards, and UI design, defined the look
and feel to be incorporated into the final product.

Development

The creative team produced the assets,
environments and UI elements needed, optimising
each to get the very best from the mobile
headsets. Interactions created had to work across
multiplayer servers in order to allow multiple users
interacting at the same time. The experience
needed to simulate changes in the environment
with respect to time and player inputs.

Delivery

Multi-user interaction increased the overall
complexity of the development. The application
was tested thoroughly in order to find and classify
any remaining bugs or issues. With user
acceptance testing complete, the application was
distributed onto Oculus Go’s for commercial
usage.