Howdy! My name is Jenna Simmons, and I am a Junior Marketing Major at Texas A&M University and have been a business development intern at JBKnowledge, Inc. for about three months. Working here has helped me grow in every way that I had hoped and I am continuously learning from my peers and managers. This internship has also opened my eyes to the complexity of the construction and technology industries while also teaching me skills that I will be able to apply towards a career in Marketing. I enjoy marketing because it gives you the opportunity to connect with others and understand how people’s minds work in different ways. Being able to understand others is especially important to know how to connect with them, which is exactly what I get to do for this internship, in the construction and technology industry.
Construction technology is an industry that is rapidly growing, and the innovations that have developed over the recent years are incredible. We are living in a time where our ideas and visions can actually be brought to life. Microsoft has partnered with Trimble and created Hololens; an innovative wearable technology that allows a user to bring designs on their computer screen to life. While wearing the Hololens device you can see the images that you normally would on your computer screen, but in 3D. Users can have hands-on interaction with their designs of, for example, a building to be constructed, and actually see them in 3D rather than having to visualize them from paper drawings.
Okay, not literally, but you get the idea. This virtual reality technology brings a large advantage to designers and architects in the AEC industry, allowing users to see their designs before the construction process has even been implemented. For construction projects, this means creating a design more efficiently and putting this design into action. You can see the design through the Hololens in 3D augmentation before it is ever actually constructed. This allows the architect to make any necessary changes and fix any issues they may see. “The thing that we can do for architects is give them much higher confidence around decision making by allowing them to literally immerse themselves in the scene they are building,” said Ben Sugden from Microsoft.
The Hololens is a mobile headwear that has no borders; no wires, cameras, or outside source plug in required. The Hololens is completely mobile, just as you are, so you can take it and use it wherever you go. This could be especially useful on the job site to see where all aspects of the design will be placed and fix any placement issues before they are physically built. This could save builders a large amount of time and money; speeding up their project time and reducing the number of setbacks on a project from having to make a changes. We look forward to seeing how this wearable technology will be used on construction job sites in the future once this device is readily available to consumers.
Click here to learn more about Microsoft’s Hololens wearable technology.