Scope AR, a San Francisco-based provider of enterprise-focused augmented reality (AR) software, has announced it is to acquire AR studio WakingApp.
WakingApp offers a proprietary AR platform which focuses on being of use to enterprises across industries. The company said it was ‘thrilled’ to join Scope AR and ‘become an integral part in the delivery of first-class AR solutions to enterprise organisations.’
Enterprises are becoming much better-acquainted with AR as recent industry moves have shown. In August Atheer, a provider of ‘augmented interactive reality’ computing, acquired digital work platform provider Flype. At the time, Atheer CEO Amar Dhaliwal said enterprises were ‘demanding’ AR platforms with broad integration, security, and reporting capabilities.
According to a PTC report around industrial innovation in May, two in three industrial companies polled said they were accelerating augmented reality deployment to improve employee productivity.
Scott Montgomerie, CEO and co-founder of Scope AR, noted similar themes with this acquisition. “We’re extremely pleased with the growth we’ve seen to date of enterprises adopting AR,” he said in a statement. “With that growth comes more knowledge of what our customers need to successfully build AR into their business.
“The WakingApp team brings a great mix of AR development experience and creative thinking to Scope AR as we continue to evolve our WorkLink platform to meet our customers’ current and future needs,” added Montgomerie.
Scope AR had previously secured $9.7 million (£7.4m) in series A funding back in March.
Acquisition will accelerate continued innovation and development of company’s WorkLink platform
San Francisco, CA – December 11, 2019 – Scope AR, the pioneer of enterprise-class augmented reality (AR) solutions, today announced its acquisition of WakingApp, an AR technology company based in Tel Aviv, Israel. With this acquisition, six of the founding members of the WakingApp team will remain with the company and bring additional resources and expertise for developing the next generation of Scope AR’s augmented reality knowledge platform, WorkLink.
“We’re extremely pleased with the growth we’ve seen to date of enterprises adopting AR,” said Scott Montgomerie, CEO and co-founder of Scope AR. “With that growth comes more knowledge of what our customers need to successfully build AR into their business. The WakingApp team brings a great mix of AR development experience and creative thinking to Scope AR as we continue to evolve our WorkLink platform to meet our customers’ current and future needs.”
WakingApp has a proprietary AR platform with technologies to help enterprises across industries easily create cutting-edge AR experiences. The acquisition of WakingApp by Scope AR expands the company’s resources to more rapidly deliver new functionality to its WorkLink solution and push the boundaries of what’s possible in enterprise AR as the market continues to mature. WorkLink is the industry’s only industrial AR knowledge platform to provide real-time remote assistance and access to pre-built AR work instructions simultaneously in one application to allow workers to easily access the knowledge they need.
“We are thrilled to join the Scope AR team and become an integral part in the delivery of first-class AR solutions to enterprise organizations,” said Matan Libis, CEO of WakingApp.
“We have a long history of supporting the most cutting-edge devices so our customers can take full advantage of AR’s most effective tools as soon as they hit the market,” said Scott Montgomerie, co-founder and CEO of Scope AR. “The HoloLens 2 represents the next generation of mixed reality hardware and we look forward to helping enterprise organizations drive even more impact through their use of AR.”
With support for Microsoft HoloLens 2, WorkLink users can explore even more complex, hands-free use cases as a result of the device’s improved wearability, expanded field of view, and enhanced gesture control and eye tracking. Now, enterprise workers can perform longer maintenance, repair or manufacturing procedures and conduct industrial tasks that require more precise hand control and interactivity.
As a long-standing Mixed Reality Partner, Scope AR today also announced its status as a Microsoft mixed reality distributor-managed partner (DMP), making it an authorized HoloLens reseller. Additionally, the company now integrates with the Azure Active Directory and its WorkLink platform is available in the Microsoft Azure Marketplace as a software solution optimized to run on Azure. Scope AR’s expanded partnership with Microsoft makes it even easier for enterprise organizations to not only find AR solutions that fit their use case needs, but also implement those solutions on supported hardware in a more seamless manner to start benefiting from the value AR can deliver immediately.
About Scope AR
Scope AR is the pioneer of enterprise-class augmented reality solutions, delivering the industry’s only cross-platform AR tools for getting workers the knowledge they need, when they need it. The company is revolutionizing the way enterprises work and collaborate by offering an integrated AR platform that provides more effective and efficient knowledge-sharing to conduct complex remote tasks, employee training, product and equipment assembly, maintenance and repair, field and customer support, and more. The company’s device-agnostic technology supports smartphones, tablets and wearables, making it easy for leading organizations like Unilever, Toyota, Lockheed Martin, Becton Dickinson, Honeywell, GE and others to quickly scale their use of AR to any remote worker. The company was founded in 2011 and is based in San Francisco with offices in Edmonton, Canada.
Media Contact: Brittany Edwards Carve Communications for Scope AR Email: scopear@carvecom.com Phone: 210-382-2165
Scope AR continues to expand its enterprise AR offerings after today announcing the acquisition of Tel Aviv based AR studio WakingApp. The acquisition will bolster the Scope’s AR development capabilities, as six of the WakingApp team’s founding members join the Scope AR mothership in North America.
Founded by CEO Scott Montgomerie, David Nedohin and Graham Melley in 2011 with a mission to build AR applications for business, Scope AR has since developed into one of the leading providers of hardware-agnostic AR solutions for a broad range of enterprises. Scope AR’s WorkLink SaaS platform combines real-time remote assistance, AR work instructions, and other features packaged in an “augmented reality knowledge platform.” WorkLink is accessible via any kind of device. “The WorkLink platform is a growing thing. We’re never going to stop adding new features and stay ahead of the industry,” said Scott Montgomerie, co-founder and CEO of Scope AR.
Over the past six years, Tel-Aviv based WakingApp AR Studios, founded by Alon Melchner, Adiel Gur and Haim Maik, has been building an app creation tool that allows developers and designers to rapidly produce AR experiences as stand-alone apps or integrate mobile AR experiences into existing mobile apps. Apps can be updated on the fly and hosted anywhere. The company has been competing on simplicity and price. This is a crowded segment, filled with well funded startups. Matan Libis, CEO of WakingApp, was shopping around for either more venture capital or perhaps something more strategic at AWE 2019 in May, where he met David Nedohin, President of Scope AR.
Scope AR’s acquisition of WakingApp will expand the WorkLink platform by integrating key functionality from WakingApp. Scope’s enterprise users which include Lockheed Martin and Unilever. We wrote about their work with Lockheed here.
Montgomerie sees the acquisition as part of the natural growth of Scope’s SaaS business, which makes up 95% of the company’s revenue. Scope AR doubled its revenue this year (2019). We wrote about their Series A round of $9.7 million in March. The growing team of over 50 is spread mostly between offices in San Francisco, Edmonton (Alberta, Canada), and now Tel Aviv.
Scope’s Series A investors were led by Romulus Capital, with participation from SignalFire, Y-Combinator and AngelList.
Company also becomes an authorized HoloLens reseller through selection as a mixed reality distributor-managed partner (DMP)
San Francisco, CA – November 7, 2019 –Scope AR, the pioneer of enterprise-class augmented reality (AR) solutions, today announced support for Microsoft HoloLens 2, which is now generally available. The company’s industrial AR knowledge platform, WorkLink, is available on the new headset immediately, allowing enterprise customers to quickly deploy AR instructions or conduct live, remote assistance video calls in even more sophisticated, hands-free use cases.
“We have a long history of supporting the most cutting-edge devices so our customers can take full advantage of AR’s most effective tools as soon as they hit the market,” said Scott Montgomerie, co-founder and CEO of Scope AR. “The HoloLens 2 represents the next generation of mixed reality hardware and we look forward to helping enterprise organizations drive even more impact through their use of AR.”
With support for Microsoft HoloLens 2, WorkLink users can explore even more complex, hands-free use cases as a result of the device’s improved wearability, expanded field of view, and enhanced gesture control and eye tracking. Now, enterprise workers can perform longer maintenance, repair or manufacturing procedures and conduct industrial tasks that require more precise hand control and interactivity.
As a long-standing Mixed Reality Partner, Scope AR today also announced its status as a Microsoft mixed reality distributor-managed partner (DMP), making it an authorized HoloLens reseller. Additionally, the company now integrates with the Azure Active Directory and its WorkLink platform is available in the Microsoft Azure Marketplace as a software solution optimized to run on Azure. Scope AR’s expanded partnership with Microsoft makes it even easier for enterprise organizations to not only find AR solutions that fit their use case needs, but also implement those solutions on supported hardware in a more seamless manner to start benefiting from the value AR can deliver immediately.
About Scope AR
Scope AR is the pioneer of enterprise-class augmented reality solutions, delivering the industry’s only cross-platform AR tools for getting workers the knowledge they need, when they need it. The company is revolutionizing the way enterprises work and collaborate by offering an integrated AR platform that provides more effective and efficient knowledge-sharing to conduct complex remote tasks, employee training, product and equipment assembly, maintenance and repair, field and customer support, and more. The company’s device-agnostic technology supports smartphones, tablets and wearables, making it easy for leading organizations like Unilever, Toyota, Lockheed Martin, Becton Dickinson, Honeywell, GE and others to quickly scale their use of AR to any remote worker. The company was founded in 2011 and is based in San Francisco with offices in Edmonton, Canada.
Media Contact: Brittany Edwards Carve Communications for Scope AR Email: scopear@carvecom.com Phone: 210-382-2165
The Aerospace industry sits on the cutting edge of technology. The components and products developed in this industry must withstand great temperatures, pressures, and forces, all while ensuring the safety of the eventual cargo, especially human passengers. Aerospace manufacturing, therefore, demands extremely accurate build and assembly processes, resulting in equally extreme manufacturing costs and complexity performed by highly trained technicians.
It’s that combination of high complexity, high cost, and need for accuracy that’s brought Augmented Reality technology and applications into the Aerospace industry. Augmented Reality in Aerospace is helping manufacturing teams work smarter, transfer training knowledge faster and more effectively, and increase the speed and accuracy of Aerospace manufacturing. These Augmented Reality solutions are driving time and cost savings that reach into the 90% range — and higher!
For example, Lockheed Martin is using our Augmented Reality in Aerospace vehicles, which can contain thousands of miles of electrical and communication wiring. This then requires hundreds or thousands of fasteners and clips, all with precise attachment points. The process for simply marking the location of these attachment points can take weeks, not to mention the prerequisite training.
We have reduced an eight hour activity to 45 min. An eight shift activity was completed in 6 hours. And with multiple shop floor activities since 2017, would you believe that not a single error has occurred while AR has been in use!?
Shelley Peterson, Lockheed Martin Space
Lockheed Martin is using our Augmented Reality technology to enable both faster and more accurate location of the attachment points. The result? A process that originally required 8 shifts and 2 technicians was reduced, using AR, to just 2.5 hours and a single technician. That’s a touch labor savings of 93%.
Augmented Reality in Aerospace is also reducing the training time for technicians. In a specific drilling application, Augmented Reality lessened ramp-up times by 85%. In another application, our Augmented Reality platform is enabling Aerospace technicians to determine if wiring harnesses are positioned correctly, even after the engine is installed on the aircraft wing. Our Augmented Reality software is also helping speed knowledge transfer and reduce work interruptions by putting contextual information in the technician’s field of view. In an actual scenario, the time to complete an Aerospace torque application process was reduced from 6 weeks to 2 weeks for an ultimate touch labor savings of 50%.
Augmented Reality in Aerospace is helping speed manufacturing processes, even in highly complex applications that used to require extensive ramp-up times. By placing the required information on work surfaces or overlayed on components, technicians can be more efficient and more accurate even with less training. This increased accuracy of Augmented Reality applications then reduces risk, increases safety, and lowers the overall cost of production.
The complexity inherent in Aerospace manufacturing is ideally suited for Augmented Reality solutions, and Scope AR is ideally suited for your Aerospace applications.
One of our takeaways from EWTS in Dallas last month was that it is not small, entrepreneurial companies that are embracing XR technology first, but rather large enterprises. The reason is simple: large companies have the luxury of innovation offices or teams charged with working with manufacturing engineers to implement process innovations.
Shelley Peterson, Emerging Technologies Lead and Principal Investigator for Augmented Reality at Lockheed Martin,, joined Lockheed Martin in 2003 as a systems engineer. In 2011, while working at Lockheed Martin’s Sunnyvale site, Shelley joined the business development team. In 2012, she shifted her focus to AR/MR, and soon after torque drilling implementations and augmented reality shop aids yielded astonishing reductions in labor, in some cases over 90%. Since then, Peterson and her team have overseen over twenty five AR technology implementations.
Peterson’s insights at the Enterprise Wearable Technology Summit in Dallas last month, led to a subsequent conversations about the secrets of Lockheed’s successes.
(1) Pick Projects With Measurable Metrics. “We felt that manufacturing was a great place to start because it’s an easy place to measure,” she began. “We can calculate how much time is being saved, and the other benefits of the technology.” Make sure it’s not because you can, but because value can be determined, says Peterson.
There are 57,000 cable harness fasteners in the Orion space vehicle that have to be placed with half-inch accuracy. With traditional methods, it took approximately 8 shifts to locate the position of several hundred fasteners. With augmented reality shop aids, 8 shifts has been reduced to 6 hours. Using the Microsoft HoloLens and Scope AR’s Worklink solution, Lockheed achieved an astonishing 93% reduction in cost.
“A great use case is not the only measure of an AR initiative. The implementation needs to be measurable. For example, you can’t prove error prevention,” Peterson continued. She believes this has been one of the main reasons she and her team have been successful.
(2) Don’t Rush. Peterson describes Lockheed as “working swiftly to bring successful solutions to Lockheed Martin Programs which make a significant impact” Paradoxically, going fast by itself won’t accomplish this. Her mantra is “observe, orient, decide, act to analyze and quantify the results on the shop floor teams’ decision making process.” Peterson stressed they deliberate about each step, over and over, and carefully assign impactful technology to optimize key elements of that decision process.
(3) Start Small. Pick initial hardware and software solutions carefully, and align the right technology to the challenge you are trying to solve. Make it easy to test and iterate things without asking anyone to commit to them. Operate in an entrepreneurial manner, focusing on the value the technology delivers.
(4) Keep It Simple. Work instructions and remote collaboration improve outcomes dependably. Make it easy to iterate. If a solution is driving a 50% measurable return, prepare it for scaling.
(5) Innovation comes from collaboration. Peterson rejects the idea that innovation is a top down or bottom up process. “It comes from all directions. Technicians, manufacturing engineers, management, and executive leadership all play a role in shaping the technology and all benefit from the technology when it is employed strategically.”
Lockheed has found virtually no difference between older workers and younger workers when it comes to process improvements. “They know the traditional approach better than anyone, and they really appreciate the optimizations that augmented reality technology delivers. The key is to make certain the end-user experience is truly an optimization from their viewpoint.”
We asked Scott Montgomerie, co-founder and CEO of Scope AR, what it was like to implement an AR solution with Lockheed. “Scope AR first met Shelley in 2015 at an office in San Francisco,” Montgomerie recalled. Shelley then invited Scope AR to their manufacturing facility in Sunnyvale, where they ideated using AR for manufacturing. “We hadn’t even launched the product when Shelley and her peers said ‘we want that.'” says Montgomerie. “It was very clear from the beginning that Shelley and Lockheed were very well aligned with ourselves in terms of what the technology could accomplish.” Over the next few years, they worked with Lockheed in a few different business units, gradually refining the product to suit Lockheed’s unique use cases. “Shelley’s commitment to finding new and impactful use cases to leverage Scope AR’s solutions was a huge driver for our success in working with Lockheed Martin. Her strong internal advocacy for Scope AR has allowed us to provide additional value to the organization much more quickly. In addition, her tenacity in measuring ROI has provided the most comprehensive and wide-ranging set of AR use cases across the manufacturing industry.”
As this catches on with manufacturing engineers we expect it will become central to a manufacturing process, not added to it, or enhancing it, but a new tool for getting things done better, faster and less expensively than they have been done before.
The Corrugating Machinery Division of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America launched its new Remote Assistance Augmented Reality Program as the latest enhancement to its industry-leading customer service support. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America (MHIA) is a leading supplier of corrugating and box-making machinery.
The new Remote Assistance Augmented Reality Program is designed to enable plant managers, technicians, and engineers to share issues in real-time from their facilities, allowing MHIA technical support staff to see and resolve machine issues and assist in troubleshooting. The program enables MHIA technical experts to draw and annotate on their device, text on the screen, and capture pictures or video for future reference.
“The industry’s best customer service just got better and we’re excited to share this latest service enhancement with our customers across North America. Our commitment to our customers continues full speed ahead,” said Darrold Phillips, vice president service, MHIA Corrugating Machinery Division. “Through our intuitive app, we can see what the customer is seeing and more quickly resolve their challenges, speeding up recovery time and, frequently, eliminating the need for a time-consuming, on-site visit.”
The Remote Assistance Augmented Reality Program was developed in conjunction with SCOPE AR, a developer of augmented-reality solutions and products for industrial clients focused around field maintenance, manufacturing and training.
The Enterprise Apps Panel Session at EWTS 2019 in Dallas, Texas, September 17-19, 2019. David Nedohin, Co-Founder & President of Scope AR was the moderator.
What is the biggest roadblock for AR adoption across industries?
The most common challenge we see enterprises face is choosing the right use case. The best way to get started with AR in the workplace is to start small. Build a practical AR project that shows real results. For example, you cannot get started by promising to overhaul your company’s end-to-end manufacturing process. Enterprises should identify one part of a process or procedure where AR can make a clear difference in terms of efficiency, quality, error reduction, and build time.
Another roadblock we see enterprise organizations struggling with is around the need to future-proof their investment in what is still an emerging technology. Executives signing off on the purchase of AR tools want to know their budget is being spent wisely and that the technology being deployed today will not be obsolete in just a few short years. Most enterprises today are looking for a cost-effective way to integrate AR into their workflow, which often means solutions that pair with existing AR-capable hardware like smartphones and tablets. After all, the cost of acquiring high-end mixed reality displays today can be prohibitive for even one unit, let alone the dozens or possibly hundreds that an enterprise may need across their workforce. No matter what AR solutions a specific business chooses, it is important to balance current needs alongside the unknowable needs of the future so that programs are scalable and that the AR content being created today – think digital work instructions or AR-enabled recorded training sessions – can still be leveraged on the devices of tomorrow.
Your company has clients across different industries and segments. Which industries hold the maximum AR adoption potential according to you?
We have seen some impressive applications in the field service, industrial manufacturing and aerospace industries, which is where we are focusing a lot of our energy. For instance, Lockheed Martin is using AR in their Space division to aid in the manufacturing of spacecraft, including NASA’s Orion. With the use of AR work instructions, they have achieved a 95+-percentage reduction in the time it takes to interpret work instructions, as well as an 85% reduction in overall training time.
Commercial kitchen equipment manufacturer, Prince Castle, is using AR-enabled live, video support tools to reduce equipment downtime in the field and improve the accuracy with which needed equipment repairs are diagnosed. Leveraging AR, remote experts can provide real-time support to workers in the kitchens of Prince Castle’s many fast-food chain customers. This has led to a 100% success rate of diagnosing support problems the first-time, eliminated service trips by 50% and reduced labor spend between 50-85%.
How has Augmented Reality transformed the B2B market?
Augmented reality has the potential to transform how an entire company works and shares knowledge. The use of AR can lead to better comprehension and communication of work instructions, decreased error rates, increased employee safety, improved worker efficiency and accuracy, as well as reduced travel and maintenance costs and decreased equipment downtime.
While more and more B2B enterprise use cases emerge, AR is becoming a ‘must-have’ technology that is driving value to enterprises today. It is no longer suitable to sit back and wait – organizations who don’t evaluate how AR can be used across many real-world business applications risk falling behind.
“Enterprises should identify one part of a process or procedure where AR can make a clear difference in terms of efficiency, quality, error reduction, and build time.”
Scott Montgomerie, CEO, and Co-founder of Scope AR
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