The laughable quality of interior GPS and mobile reception in some places has left big gaps in indoor navigation. Gaps that even the major map applications struggle to fill.
Soon shops, colleges and enterprises can finally show guests or customers where their meeting, brand of shampoo or work location is with impressive hyper-accurate augmented reality.
The HyperVR app is out now for iOS and Android. It offers select global locations from big brands to explore if you’re in the right area. The companion SDK and Hyper View app provide an easy-to-create-maps experience for businesses, enabling any key locations and every store aisle or ward mapped down to the metre.
Across multiple floors, up ramps, down stairs and elevators, HyperAR provides accessible routing with a map-based plan and AR route guide to a destination. Users can simply tilt their phones to change the view. Soon, when the store changes layout or an enterprise has a new herd of interns, no one should get lost again.
Going places with HyperAR
Appealing to colleges, healthcare, retail and other large environments, HyperAR or similar solutions can resolve customer or visitor frustration, and add new options for retail apps, giving them greater in-store utility. Currently, any business can sign up for free and create super-accurate maps of their premises.
Augmented reality arrived on Apple’s iOS 11 for mass audience use. Outdoor AR navigation and games (like Pokemon Go) remain the primary use cases. But indoor navigation, gamification (treasure hunts and puzzles) features and mixed-reality marketing could give AR a useful shot in the arm.
Apps like IKEA Place (pictured) have found a spot on many shoppers’ smartphones showing furniture in-situ around your home or office. But being able to race around their massive stores to find the exact items you need would be a great boost.
Brands like Sainsbury’s, Decathlon and institutions including Queen Mary University London have been trialling the HyperAR app, and we look forward to seeing it in wider action.