June 2018
Microchip Matters Swedish commuters
The airline plans to close its data centres
are using implants to replace rail tickets E XC LU S I V E
Augmented Reality The role of AR in the oil and gas industries
How one global insurer is pushing for positive social change
Nathan Trousdell
Director – Strategy, Data & Innovation at Payvision – sheds light on the omnichannel consumer experience
TECH NEWS • TOP 10 AWARD WINNERS • GOOGLE SOFTWARE • INDUSTRY INTERVIEWS
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Welcome to the June issue of Digital Innovation Magazine. We’re really proud to bring you the latest version of our European digital tech magazine, brimming with industry interviews, up-to-the-minute technology news, as well as a host of exciting innovations. I was delighted to chat to our cover star, Nathan Trousdell of global acquiring bank, Payvision, last month (p28). I’m a frequent online shopper, but never had I considered the processes in place in order for transactions to occur. Thank you, Nathan, you have certainly broadened my horizons! What’s more, it was great to talk to Deepak Soni, Director – Commercial Intermediary at AXA Insurance (p46). Isn’t it reassuring to think such a huge operation as AXA is working hard to drive social change in a positive way for future generations? It’s a win-win situation, satisfying the expectations of shareholders, customers and employees alike. Other features sure to be of interest to you include our report on the Swedish trend for microchipping (p18), plus the development of new Google software capable of outperforming the human brain (p56). And we’re celebrating the hard work of some of the winners at this year’s National Technology Awards, which were held in London last May (72). Congratulations to everyone who was lucky enough to scoop one of the coveted awards!
Editor Anna McMahon
Managing Director Danielle Harris
editorial@digitalinnovationeu.com
d.harris@digitalinnovationeu.com
Senior Digital Designer Daniel May
Managing Director Tom Barnes
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+44 (0) 203 890 1189 enquiries@digitalinnovationeu.com All rights reserved. Every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of material published in Digital Innovation Magazine. However, the company cannot accept responsibility for the claims made by advertisers or contributors, or inaccurate material supplied by advertisers. Digital Innovation is a trading name of HBL Europe Ltd. Company Registration Number: 10933897. Company Registered in England and Wales
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I Meet Nathan Trousdell, Director Data Science & Strategy at Payvision
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The futu microchi
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6
National Technology Award winners
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Ryanair’s de close data 4
Deepak Soni of AXA Insurance on the company’s philanthropy policy
ure of ipping
The role of AR in the gas and oil industries
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ecision to a centres
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Trends spotted at VivaTech 2018
Google’s latest AI software 5
TOP 10
Reaping the
Rewards We celebrate some of the winners of this year’s National Technology Awards.
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Transport Technology of the Year Award WINNER: Unmanned Life
With its Autonomy as a Service (AtaS) platform, Unmanned Life’s vision is to drive this disruptive change across multiple core sectors of the economy, working hand-inhand with the major industrial behemoths in these large multi-billion dollar industrial sectors to enable the fourth industrial revolution.
Healthcare Technology of the Year Award WINNER: Medopad
Medopad is a British healthcare technology company, transforming how healthcare providers, doctors and patients connect with each other. The company’s remote patient monitoring applications, mobile technology and advanced data analytics unite to deliver a highly personalised, efficient care experience.
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Finance Technology of the Year Award WINNER: Seedrs
Seedrs enables all types of investors to invest in businesses they believe in and share in their success. The company enables all types of growth-focused businesses to raise capital and a community in the process, protecting and empowering investors whilst helping businesses to grow.
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TV, Film and Broadcasting Technology of the Year Award WINNER: YouView
Back in 2012, some of the UK’s best known broadcasters and broadband internet companies talked about how they could improve the TV viewing experience. YouView was born out of various frustrations such as missing a great show or being unable to find something to watch.
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Tech Growth Business of the Year Award WINNER: JustPark
JustPark is a technology platform that matches drivers with parking spaces through its website and mobile app. The service lets drivers book via the app or website, and includes commercial and public car parks, in addition to private parking spaces, allowing property owners to make money from their unused spaces.
Innovation of the Year Award WINNER: Darktrace
Darktrace is a global machine learning company for cyber defence. Recognised for its Enterprise Immune System technology, inspired by the self-learning intelligence of the human immune system, this new class of technology has enabled a fundamental shift in the way organisations defend themselves.
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Consumer Product of the Year Award WINNER: Sparrho
Sparrho combines human and artificial intelligence to help research professionals and layman users stay up-to-date with new scientific publications and patents. Sparrho’s recommendation engine provides personalised scientific news-feeds by using proprietary machine learning algorithms to aggregate, distil and recommend relevant content.
Retailing Technology of the Year Award WINNER: Henderson Technology
Henderson Technology is part of the Henderson-Group of companies from the UK. It has been supplying Electronic Point of Sale (EPoS) systems since 1994, and is currently the largest supplier of EPoS in Northern Ireland, with over 350 retail sites in the province using systems supplied by the company. 13
VR Product of the Year Award WINNER: ZeroLight
ZeroLight provides a range of solutions, empowering brands, agencies and customers through visualisation. Products include retail configurator, virtual reality, cloud retail, experimental retail, web configurator, 3D explorer, mobile VR, mobile AR, video fascinator, 3D modelling, data reader, live shot, and environment creation.
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Manufacturing or Construction Technology of the Year Award WINNER: Lucas
Starting life as a specialist spray and painting contractor, Lucas has since expanded its skills and capabilities to enter a variety of construction industry sectors, operating with agility and promptness, in a positive, forwardthinking and proactive environment.
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MICROCHIP NEWS
Under the Skin Technophile Swedes are making life easier with microchips implanted into their hands to replace rail tickets.
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A Swedish rail company is giving passengers the option of using biometric chips, implanted into their hands, in lieu of a paper train ticket.
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he company, SJ, is the first in the world to utilise this innovative technology, known as Near Field Communication (NFC), which works the same as an Oyster card or contactless bank card. The size of a grain of rice, these tiny microchips use radio frequency identification (RFID) to interface over a range of frequencies with other
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connected devices. The procedure is similar to that of a piercing and involves a syringe injecting the chip into the person’s hand. As many as 3,000 Swedes are thought to have had the microchip implanted to date, with many of them working in the technology industry. The scheme is only open to people who have already had the implant fitted. Customers buy
Photographer / Source Henry Lundholm
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“According to SJ, it launched the scheme in response to demand from its customers�
Photographer / Source Stefan Nilsson 22
credit card use. You can already be tracked in many different ways other than a microchip.” According to SJ, it launched the scheme in response to demand from its customers. Being quicker to scan a microchip than a travel card, it saves time as well as being more environmentally-friendly, but the main benefit of the microchip is that it puts the travel company at the centre of the digital revolution.
tickets in the normal way by logging onto the website or mobile app, and their membership number, which is the SJ’s spokesperson added, “As north Europe’s largest train operator, and reference code for the ticket, is linked to their chip. Conductors then simply scan each passenger’s hand. Reaction to the scheme has been largely positive, although some security issues have been raised. A spokesperson from SJ said, “Of course, there are mixed reactions. Some people are concerned with the privacy issue, and that’s something we take really seriously. We came up with using the membership number which doesn’t tell anyone anything – a third party couldn’t make anything of it even if they got hold of it. “Some people are confused and think they can be tracked via microchip, but if that’s something they’re worried about, they should be more concerned by their mobile phone and
Photo courtesy of chip-implants.com 23
“The main benefit of the microchip is that it puts the travel company at the centre of the digital revolution�
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Crister Fritzson CEO & President at SJ
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“I don’t think our current technology is enough to get chip hacked, but I may think about this again in the future. I could always take it out then” one of the top 10 digital companies in Sweden, we are at the forefront of digital developments. This is an interesting project that gives us ideas of how to enhance the digital customer experience even further.” Ulrika Celsing had a microchip implanted into her hand at a work event – a process that is known as ‘biohacking’. The 28-year-old said, “It was fun to try something new and to see what one could use it for to make life easier in the future. I don’t think
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our current technology is enough to get chip hacked, but I may think about this again in the future. I could always take it out then.” SJ isn’t the only Swedish company to take advantage of the biometric chip trend. One company, Epicenter, gives employees the option of having a chip implanted in order to access the offices, while a chain of Swedish gyms lets clients use their chip as a membership card. It’s not hard to see a future where store payments,
gaining entrance to your property, and identify verification are all done at the swipe of a hand. As far as the future is concerned, SJ’s spokesperson concluded, “The speed of digitalisation is so fast, anything can be obsolete in less than 12 months. There might be a whole
new generation of microchips that are smarter and better. Finnair is already using face recognition at check-in, so that could be the next big thing when it comes to boarding planes and trains.� For further information on how SJ are using this technology, visit their website.
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B U S I N E S S I N T E RV I E W
FIRST PAST THE POST In an exclusive interview, we talk to Nathan Trousdell, Director Data Science & Strategy at Payvision, a global merchant acquirer and omnichannel payment service provider. Written by Anna McMahon • Produced by Tom Barnes
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Offering one secure payment platform payment processing, Payvision is a tr party for transactions, making the pro smooth and safe as possible for its c
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athan explained, “When our CEO, Rudolf Booker, founded Payvision in 2002, he saw major potential in the online transactions space. At the time, traditional banks didn’t really know how to underwrite the risk properly, as a lot of fraud was occurring. After a move to the US to learn more from banks there, which were handling this risk effectively, Payvision really took off.” Regulated by the Dutch Central Bank, Payvision has since evolved from an acquiring bank to a complete, omnichannel payment service provider. Formerly, when a transaction took place, many different companies were involved in the process, but in the last few years, Payvision has made a move towards handling the entire transaction process.
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“A key partnership with software provider, Cloudera, has enabled the company to push forward and reap the rewards of employing one of the leading global technology packages” “We live in a very fragmented world, so our goal is to simplify the process for merchants and their customers. Our platform is also now available in store as well as online, providing a full omnichannel consumer experience. Customers can make a purchase anywhere, and at any time – they are technologically-
empowered and also quick to act if something is not going their way. It is thought that consumers leave a website if they cannot get what they want after five seconds. It is therefore our aim to work with merchants to serve such tech-savvy consumers in a simpler and more convenient way.”
One platform 80 ways to pay Payvision offers merchants more ways to accept payments debit cards, credit cards, AliPay, iDeal, and other alternative payment methods, whether the sale is in store, online or mobile. 33
“Payvision’s investment in th skills required to analyse and u they and their merchants gathe become a frontrunner in the
Payvision prides itself on being a data-driven enterprise, collecting insights into the payment journey, to best serve merchants. As Nathan explained, “If you don’t have evidence behind what you do, then you’re just another person with an opinion. When we process transactions, we create data, such as information surrounding fraud scoring, for example. We collect this information and analyse it, aiming to provide evidence-based decision-making. It is not enough to just process transactions. If a company is not data-driven, grounding its processes on evidence-based decision-making, it will either fail in becoming a successful organization or be forced to switch gears and put data at the core of their strategy.
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he optimal technologies and use the massive volume of data er has enabled the company to e payment processing field” We have chosen to lead with it, rather than watch it happen. This has allowed us to become trusted advisors to our customers rather than just the people processing their transactions.” A key partnership with software and support provider, Cloudera, has enabled the company to push forward and reap the rewards of employing one of the leading global technology packages. “We started working with Cloudera last September, although we have been using big data technology for a number of years. We asked Cloudera to provide our underlying data technology stack, as it’s a a one of – if not the – global leader in the field, so it was very easy to get it integrated across the various areas of our business. The solutions that they offer are also intuitive,
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powerful and stable, which is really important in our line of work”, Nathan explained.
such as optimizing conversion and authorization rates, reducing fraud in real-time, and providing merchants with strategic insights on their own business and customers that they don’t always have themselves. Ten years ago, I read and talked to people about how data science was going to change the world and disrupt companies, which has indeed happened. The main problems holding it back are old IT systems and information being kept in an archaic, fragmented ways, and business leaders not understanding that this is a fundamental problem. There’s a great McKinsey report that goes into this comparing potential value to be gained in 2011 versus actual value gained by 2016.”
Payvision’s investment in the optimal technologies and skills required to analyse and use the massive volume of data they and their merchants gather has enabled the company to become a frontrunner in the payment processing field. Nathan said, “There is sometimes a lack of understanding of the optimal technologies and processes that can help many businesses. I think this is borne from leaders not keeping abreast of what this technology is capable of versus legacy systems. Fortunately, Payvision chose to invest in data science and data engineering teams a few years ago, so we’re really reaping the benefits now, and so are “Companies using old systems and our customers. We have great experts thinking patterns are not looking at working with us to solve the challenges tomorrow’s problem. It is essential to keep up-to-speed with emergent technologies to solve tomorrow’s problems today. It’s all about becoming an evidence-based data-driven business.” With this in mind, we asked Nathan what does the future have in store for Payvision and the global payments space? “We recently announced a strategic partnership with global banking
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“Companies using old systems and thinking patterns are not looking at tomorrow’s problem. It is essential to keep up-to-speed with emergent technologies to solve tomorrow’s problems today. It’s all about becoming an evidence-based data-driven business” Nathan Trousdell, Director Data Science & Strategy giant ING, which supports us in our journey to become a global leader in the payment industry. Backed by ING, Payvision will boost its growth, extend its global network and broaden its payment product portfolio, by creating tailor-made payments solutions designed for the fast-paced international retail environment. So, we will continue to optimize the omnichannel consumer experience, as well as keeping a keen eye on emergent technologies to benefit our merchants. Also, there is potential for blockchain technology to have a positive
impact on our business and the businesses we serve, for instance. It will change the world, but it’s still going through a lot of hype and Darwinism, so it may be some time before we see any major problems solved by truly scalable methods that are economic. In addition, as augmented and virtual reality become part of the omnichannel experience, we need to work on how they are integrated into the payment journey, ensuring our merchants remain at the cutting-edge of their respective industries.”
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D ATA C E N T R E N E W S
Ryanair Goes ‘A
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All In’
The airline is closing its data centres in a move to Amazon Web Services (AWS) databases.
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Low-cost airline, Ryanair, plans to close the majority of its data centres over the next three years and move operations to the public cloud, having signed a new contract with AWS.
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yanair carries over 130 million customers every year on more than 2,000 daily flights, and already runs several elements of its core business on AWS, including its main website and hotel booking service. As part of its three-year standardisation plan, Ryanair will adopt AWS databases, analytics, machine learning and deep learning services, while also building a company-wide data lake on Amazon’s Simple Storage Service (S3), allowing it
to stream customer and business data in real-time by using Amazon Kinesis to gain insights. John Hurley, CTO at Ryanair, said that the shift will allow the company to ‘transform’ its customers’ travel experiences, which have been built on the basis of low cost, rather than high quality service. The European airline has already started using AWS Machine-Learning Solutions Lab to create an application capable
What is AWS? 40
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of automatically detecting surges in demand for specific flights, and foreseeing any changes to flight schedules. In addition, by migrating from Microsoft SQL Server to Amazon Aurora, Ryanair, which sends out over 22 million emails daily to its customers, can now run one of the largest email marketing campaigns in Europe, with higher performance at a fraction of the cost. John Hurley said, “Machine learning is hugely important to our growth,” adding that the company is also exploring Amazon SageMaker in a bid to personalise the MyRyanair portal for every unique traveller. He added, “We’ve chosen to work with the world’s leading cloud to develop and deliver services by
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rebuilding core applications, converting data into actionable insights, and creating intelligent applications. We are putting the solutions in place to continue our leadership in the travel industry.” Ryanair is currently trialling Amazon Lex to enhance the customer support experience, by intelligently routing customer support requests
“Leaders in the airline industry, like many large enterprises, are using AWS in a meaningful way to evolve their businesses and innovate on behalf of their customers� Mike Clayville, vice president worldwide commercial sales at AWS
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to the right type of assistance, be it a customer support representative or an artificial intelligence-driven interaction. John added, “We were one of the first companies in Europe to support Amazon Alexa, and created the MyRyanair skills for Amazon Alexa to handle account bookings, flight enquiries, and frequently asked questions.” Mike Clayville, vice president worldwide commercial sales at AWS, explained, “Leaders in the airline industry, like many large enterprises, are using AWS in a meaningful way to evolve their
Dublin Head Quarters 44
“Because we h comprehensive set including our le learning and deep Ryanair will be able services to drive gre employee s
Mike Clayville, vice president wo
have the most t of cloud services, eading machine p learning services, e to employ those eater customer and satisfaction�
orldwide commercial sales at AWS
businesses and innovate on behalf of their customers. They are deploying new applications to the cloud by default, and looking to migrate as many of their existing applications as they can as quickly as possible. Because we have the most comprehensive set of cloud services, including our leading machine learning and deep learning services, Ryanair will be able to employ those services to drive greater customer and employee satisfaction. We are excited to help them create first-class experiences on AWS, as they continue to use our capabilities and services at an accelerated pace.�
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B U S I N E S S I N T E RV I E W
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Deepak Soni, Director – Commercial Intermediary at AXA Insurance – explains how a global insurance company can help steer social change in the right direction. 47
Heading up the commercial intermediator business at AXA Insurance, Deepak Soni is a firm believer in putting the customer first.
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t is a business model that sets AXA apart from other insurers, facilitating the company’s growth into one of the largest global insurers, offering a broad range of products to help people live their lives in the best possible way. Deepak explains, “The attraction of AXA as both an employee and as a customer of AXA is that they always start with their customers. As one
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of the largest global insurers, our purpose is to empower people to live a better life. We do that through tailoring services and solutions to over 107 million customers globally. We continue to grow and work hard with them to identify different solutions to different changes in their lives, whether personal or professional. There is not an area of someone’s life where we do not have the opportunity to positively
Around
156,000 The amount of people AXA employs
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The amount of countries AXA operates in Over
â‚Ź100bn The amount of revenue AXA generates
4.8 / 5
The average score AXA receives for customer service
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help. The more we can be there, the more we can allow people to do what they want to do. That’s our continued focus.”
customers’ expectations, investing heavily in research to push for new solutions. Deepak said, “Our purpose is to look at how we can be better. We believe that because we are AXA prides itself on actively working such a large organisation, we can with different strands of its business to make a difference, not just to our link customers with different solutions. direct customers, but to other people Deepak added, “As an organisation worldwide. A couple of years ago, the size of AXA, we have the we decided that we would not invest opportunity to draw on a vast amount in any tobacco firms. A number of of skills and resources, globally. One of other large organisations have also
“In recent years, the company has received numerous accolades, particularly for its continued high ratings for customer satisfaction” the things that makes us quite unique as an organisation, so I believe, is our ability to draw on all those resources and personalise the product to meet the customer’s individual needs. You see it going on minute by minute, day by day, across the organisation, which is fantastic, especially given the size of us.” AXA’s aim is to constantly explore, learn and look at the changes that are taking place in line with their
adopted a similar strategy. That’s a choice we made as an organisation, but what we’ve recognised is, being the size we are, we can influence social change. There are not many organisations that can say that.” The size and scale of AXA enable the business to push boundaries in this way – it operates over 60 different countries, employs around 51
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“A few years ago, we invested over £100 million into research funds, with more than 300 projects over a three-year period. We helped provide research and education to a whole array of different areas, certainly within the healthcare sector”
Deepak Soni, Director – Commercial Intermediary
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156,000 people, and generates over €100 billion in revenue. Its ability to positively drive social change is something that many of its customers are pleased to support. Deepak said, “More and more people are conscious about what they buy and who they buy it from, over and above the product, service and cost behind it, playing to their own individual social or moral values. A few years ago, we invested over £100 million into research funds, with more than 300 projects over a three-year period. We helped provide research and education to a whole array of different areas, certainly within the healthcare sector.” In recent years, the company has received numerous accolades, particularly for its continued high ratings for customer satisfaction. In 2017, AXA was awarded the FeeFoo Gold Trusted Merchant Award, based on reviews from genuine customers. AXA consistently receives high scores, averaging 4.8 out of 5 for its service, and 4.5 out of 5 from a claims point of view. Deepak added, “For me, this explains that we do what we say we are going to do, when we are going to do it. From a pure insurance perspective, (when the customer calls to make a claim), it is at a time of 54
loss, so it’s the worst time to find out if something doesn’t work. For me, that’s testament to the fact that the work we do continues to be effective. You otherwise wouldn’t receive that level of rating, and that level of feedback, continuously.” AXA settles around 92-95 per cent of all claims, paying within two hours on many occasions. Deepdak added, “As an industry, we’ve changed significantly in terms of how we go about settling claims. Within 24 hours, we can deal with a claim, and pay within two hours. From a business perspective, that, for me, is a huge winner. It offers fantastic peace and mind.” The company is heavily involved in autonomous vehicles, looking at implications from an insurance policy perspective. According to Deepak, “Autonomous vehicles will be on our roads at some point in the future. Given the fact that we are a large motor insurer globally, it’s highly important that we understand everything that’s associated with autonomous vehicles, so we can provide the right product for consumers.” For further information on AXA, visit www.axa.com
Photo from www.tesla.com/en_GB/autopilot
“Given the fact that we are a large motor insurer globally, it’s highly important that we understand everything that’s associated with autonomous vehicles, so we can provide the right product for consumers” Deepak Soni, Director – Commercial Intermediary
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A RT I F I C I A L I N T E L L I G E N C E
A Google supercomputer has created its own automated machine capable of outperforming the human brain.
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Researchers at Google have successfully designed a computer-made system known as NASNet, which puts together and trains an entirely new neural network, saving scientists months of testing and refining.
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he new automated machine learning structure is able to identify objects, such as people and cars, in photographs and videos, marking a major breakthrough in the use of advanced AutoML for image detection purposes. The premise is fairly simple – the ‘parent AI’ creates its very own ‘child AI’, NASNet, that not only outperforms the original, but it is also better than anything human-made.
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Building on previous research in evolutionary and reinforcement learning algorithms, the so-called AI child consistently performed better in lab testing than any man-made AI system. These new findings reveal that automation is the key to creating the most secure AI systems, thus AI is capable of creating more AI, undermining the role of data scientists. The ImageNet image classification and COCO object detection sets, two of the most respected large-scale
NASNet’ Prediction accuracy (1.2 per cent better than all previously published results)
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“We hope that the larger mac learning community will be a build on these models to add multitudes of computer visio problems we have not yet ima
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chine able to dress on agined”
data sets in computer vision, were used in this study. For the ImageNet image classification, NASNet showed a prediction accuracy of 82.7 per cent (1.2 per cent better than all previously published results), while the predictive performance on COCO object detection tasks was 43.1 per cent (4 per cent better than previously published). However, the process used by NASNet is far more laborious than the phrase ‘automation’ might suggest. In the early stages of network creation, scientists must analyse reams of neural network test results to ensure its controller neural net will effectively put feedback into practice. Once the parent network is optimised to aim for an architecture output with a given probability, it can train a child network within the architecture to attain target accuracy. A feedback loop ensures the gradient of the initial probability is scaled by the child’s network accuracy and inputs the results back to the controller. The individual networks exchange improved neural models thousands of times until the optimal accuracy is reached. The Google team said, “We hope that the larger machine learning
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“It’s not very difficult to se NASNet could be employed in a surveillance systems in the n community will be able to build on these models to address multitudes of computer vision problems we have not yet imagined.” But, ethical concerns have been raised about the invention of such powerful machines. Tech site, Futurism, said, “What if AutoML creates systems so fast that society can’t keep up with the rapid pace at which the AI is developed? It’s not very difficult to see how NASNet could be employed in automated surveillance systems in the near future, perhaps sooner than
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regulations could be put in place to control such systems.” Google’s engineering director, Ray Kurzweil, is a firm believer that AI is designed to enhance the world, rather than damage it. He said, “Technology has always been a double-edged sword – fire kept us warm, cooked our food, and burned down our houses. In World War II, 50 million people died, and that was certainly exacerbated by the power of technology at that time. My view is not that AI is going to displace us. It’s going to enhance us. It does already.”
ee how automated near future�
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AU G M E N T E D R E A L I T Y
HEADING
AR is being employed fo and safety in the oil
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OFFSHORE
or service, maintenance l and gas industries.
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The idea of overlaying computer-generated 3D content into the real world around us is being used to drastically revolutionise some of the most fundamental industries in the world.
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he oil and gas sector constantly tests people and machines to the limit, so it’s an ideal proving ground for emerging technologies, with AR already being relied on for mission critical operations. Service and maintenance is being transformed by the use of AR.
Antycip Simulation’s
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Engineers can use a tablet-based system to scan machines to help with troubleshooting, and follow guidelines for conducting maintenance or changing parts. European leader in COTS modelling, analysis and simulation software, Antycip Simulation, recently completed a 5m by 2m 4k stereo single screen display for reviewing seabed geological data to help better design, model and analyse the options for drilling, piping and developing oil and gas fields. Antycip Simulation’s marketing manager, Frank Reynolds, said, “The size of the screen and depth of detail have led to better insight, better communication and better collaboration.”
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Find out more about the Adroit app
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“The oil and gas industries are leading the way, as more and more companies are becoming open to the idea of adopting AR in the workplace�
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Dexon Systems provides solutions for any multi-image video wall or control room visualisation project. The company has seen a huge increase in demand for video walls for the control rooms of remotely operated vehicles (ROVs). Business development manager, Andrew Rothery, said, “The ability to display live camera images, sonar and telemetry data simultaneously is key. ROVs can be 4,000m below the surface, carrying out tasks that need extreme accuracy, so the time to display the image coming from specialist on-board cameras could mean the difference between success and failure.”
oil and gas companies to have preplanned exit routes and safety plans in place in the event of a fire. Workers wearing an AR headset will have a virtual path drawn out for them to guide them to safety. The technology detects exactly where the threat is coming from, providing the shortest and safest directions. By having the AR headsets GPS enabled, this would give exact numbers on who has made it to safety and where to find them.
The technical demands of this can be phenomenal. Dexon Systems’ customers are now asking for 4k camera images to be relayed from a depth of 4km!
EFFICIENCY IN THE WORKPLACE Adroit also has the ability to scan items to identify any malfunctioning parts, providing step-by-step overlaid instructions on how to fix them. This saves time on workers having to revert to the old-fashioned trial and error system. Once repaired, Adroit can check the work is complete, prepare a report, and send all the details to the relevant individuals.
SAFETY FIRST Safety and efficiency are two of the biggest concerns for the oil and gas industry. With the AR app, Adroit, safety improvements have been made by simply wearing an AR headset or by using an enabled mobile device. Regulations require
The oil and gas industries are leading the way, as more and more companies are becoming open to the idea of adopting AR in the workplace. As it is still early days, who knows how these emerging technologies can be further implemented to achieve the desired results?
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T R E N D WAT C H
H e av y H
We bring you o from this year’s V celebrating the be European t
Photos by Jean-C 72
Hitters
our highlights VivaTech festival, est of French and technology.
Claude Guilloux 73
Artificial Intelligence Microsoft’s stand saw machines sorting through historic documents scanned as PDF files and allowing users to make keyword searches across the text. It’s amazing how a computer can actually ‘read’ handwritten notes from the past!
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Robotics SoftBank Robotics has developed a robot called Pepper, who is emotional, expressive, autonomous, scalable, easy to use and affordable, all rolled into one. The child-sized robot will give you a hug, hold a conversation and work its magic on the dancefloor, making it a revolutionary business tool to enhance the customer experience, particularly in the hospitality and tourism industries. The simple tablet interface and voice-recognition technology mean it can be adapted for airports, hotels and restaurants, offering guidance and information to visitors.
DNA Microsoft innovator Doug Carmean presented new data storage technology, enabling you to store your files on a strand of DNA. The data is 3D-printed as synthetic DNA, and it is write-only, meaning it cannot be changed once it’s done. Doug said, “You could basically put all the data on the internet into something as big as a shoebox.�
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st g r e b r e k uc Z k r a M r en e h d n w u s e o f c a k it f s e u s s Faceboo i g rin e t l i f t n e the cont
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th i w l a e d I to A n i h t i a f nth o 's m m r t i s f a s l i ch e T a v i V tressed h h ug o r h t d e s n he pas
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Pharmaceuticals French-company LNC Therapeutics aims to tackle the obesity problem by studying the good bacteria that work with the human body to keep us healthy. The idea is to produce one of the key bugs in our gut to help those who are overweight. Christensenella, a recently-discovered microbe that those with a healthy body weight possess, is the key to achieving better bodyweight – by popping pills to induce weight loss. The work is still in its pre-clinical phase at the moment.
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B i ot e c h n o lo gy One engineering student proudly showed off his Lego prosthetic arm at VivaTech. David Aguilar was born with a deformed right arm, so he put his passion for Lego to good use by building various prosthetic limbs over the years, incorporating new skills and technologies as he grew older. His current model features fishing cable and a battery-powered bicep, and is capable of opening doors and supporting him whilst doing push-ups.
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