Turning a Game Engine into a Training Experience, with PIXO VR’s Sean Hurwitz

XR for Business

English - March 24, 2020 10:00 - 27 minutes - 25.6 MB - ★★★★★ - 12 ratings
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Today’s guest Sean Hurwitz started his journey to the XR field in the realm of game development. But as the years went on, more and more he saw the value of putting game engines to work training professionals instead of hunting zombies. He talks about how PIXO VR achieves this.

Alan: Hey, everyone, it's Alan
Smithson here with the XR for Business podcast. Today we're speaking
with Sean Hurwitz, founder and CEO of PIXO VR, a Detroit based
company focused on VR software for training on processes, safety, and
emergency response. Much like myself, Sean believes that extended
reality -- or XR -- technologies can unlock human potential, and
realize limitless possibilities. He's assembled an all-star team of
game changing VR and AR engineers, and we're going to talk about how
this translates directly into safety and training across all
different industries. All that and more on the XR for Business
podcast.

Sean, welcome to the show, my friend.

Sean: Hi, Alan. Thanks for
having me.

Alan: It's my absolute pleasure.
I'm really, really excited. I've been kind of using your VR training
video that you did. It was in a basement, and you're training gas
meter people on how to how to -- I guess --use a gas meter. But I've
been using that video to show the diverse range of things that can be
done within VR. Tell us about that. Tell us about PIXO VR.

Sean: Yes, I am definitely
onboard with the way that XR and training will definitely change the
ecosystem, make people's lives safer and more effective, and
hopefully make more money too, at the end. So yeah, the example that
you give is a replication of a basement, where technicians were in
the traditional way of training, driving around, mirroring or
shadowing older technicians as the evolving workforce and the younger
generation coming in. And they were training the new employees, the
new trainees, and they were looking for a way to do this training
that would be close to real life, rather than drive around for weeks
or months on end. And they couldn't show-- the problem was they
couldn't really identify or show all the variances in the gas meters
in these basements. So we did a multi-user randomized scenario of
millions of different setups and scenarios of what these gas meters
would look like, and really expedited the training timeline. So PIXO,
that's sort of the-- using your video as an example. But we started
as a traditional console video game company, moving quickly into
mobile and enterprise, and then even quicker in 2016 into getting the
first Oculus DK and starting to build enterprise VR training, from
that point forward.

Going from making games, because I just
interviewed Arash Keshmirian from Extality, and he was doing the same
thing. They were making virtual or augmented reality games for
phones. And now they're making enterprise solutions. How did you make
that shift from going to making games to enterprise? And was it
simply a way of making money or just-- what is the precipitating
factor of going from making games to basements full of gas fitting
technology?

Sean: Well, money certainly
plays a role, but really the mission to make people's lives better,
to help improve the planet that we live on, being able to utilize the
skill set that we've spent combined dozens of years, used the same
skill set, even the same game engine as to develop interactive games
-- which is really what this training is -- to be able to replicate
things that you either were too expensive to do otherwise or just too
risky to do. So, once we figured out that we were able to create the
scenarios in the field -- or in a basement, like you said earlier --
and then actually make money doing it served the purpose and the
mission, and also getting paid for solving problems rather than
developing games and hopi

Sean, welcome to the show, my friend.

Sean: Hi, Alan. Thanks for
having me.

Alan: It's definitely one of
those things that you can do a lot more good with these things. Now,
what kind of elements have you taken from the game production side --
or days -- and brought them in? Have you gamified these things? Is
there like, a hidden thing where I can pull out a sword and start
cutting things in half? Do you guys have any hidden Easter eggs in
there?

Sean: Maybe not Easter eggs, but
something along those lines would be the randomization engine that we
have. So every time you enter into an environment where applicable --
which for us is the vast majority -- where we randomize different
hazards or defects or different things that you have to learn. As an
example, we developed the fall protection module for mostly the
construction industry where you have to pick-- you're up on an 80
storey building -- again, utilizing all environments, 3D modelling
scenarios that you would build in a video game -- and you put someone
80 storeys above the ground on scaffolding, and they have to pick the
right harness. So when the harnesses are randomized every time, you
really have that decision making utilized there. We use a lot of game
level design as well. And if you pick the wrong harness, obviously,
you fall to your death -- really -- on this 80 storey building. Good
news is it's all virtual, so you learn your lesson, one way or the
other. So we utilize, really, all game development techniques for
that module and everything that we build, whether it be the design,
whether it be the game level, whether it be the data analytics and
reporting from the user management. And understanding not only how to
optimize these applications, but how did you do, it could be used at
a competitive basis where you can compete against your previous
training, the previous time that you went in, or against other
co-workers. So many, many different game aspects used.

Alan: Interesting. What are some
of the data points you're collecting about users and learners, and
how are you measuring success with this type of technology, versus
just a standard classroom or on the job training? What's the
measurement of success?

Sean: Well, like I said before,
the ability to really have someone do something and interact in an
environment through an active learning process. One of the best uses
that we found for VR currently is in assessment. So let's just stick
with this fall protection. How would you assess if somebody really
understood what to do when they were up on this scaffold? This is a
way to really test their skill set, and if they fail, they're able to
fail at a low cost and at a low risk scenario. So that's not
something that you can do in a classroom. You can take a test, as you
know, PowerPoint. We've used in the past. You can you can take a
three ring binder and study it, go through it, do a test. But it's
not like actually doing it. So we track all the points, what they
pick first, what they pick second, what they look at, where they go.
All the data points that make up the story about whether that trainee
actually knows what they're doing. And as you know, with VR -- and
XR, really -- with biometrics coming on to the scene here, in the
near future, you'll be able to track cognitive load and how their
body actually responds to those different training scenarios.

Alan: Are things like biometrics
becoming part of this, or is this kind of a future plan? Because I
would think that being 80 storeys up is kind of terrifying. People's
heart rate must be going through the roof.

Sean: Oh, it sure is. Yeah, I
definitely think that biometrics is going to play a huge role in all
of XR, specifically in this VR training because you could use it then
as an assessment tool. Not only on the individual trainee and the
potential employee early on, it could be used at a interview process
early on in the cycle or later on. And did they get better? Are they
more comfortable in these different situations? As well as to
optimize the experience. So is it too much training? We recently
developed a emergency response natural gas leak scenario, where
you're in the middle of a subdivision -- and again -- utilizing
multi-user, some AI components and a technician is faced with a
potentially very serious gas leak that they have to eventually turn
that gas off. Now, the training not only tells you about the
individual, but it could also tell you about is this just too much
for an individual? Does it require two people? It could influence the
real life training thereafter.

Alan: So how do you measure that
then? Like, how do you know whether somebody is ready?

Sean: Well, we're currently not
using any biometrics right now, but once the new hardware comes onto
the scene with sensors in it, that will track that person's cognitive
load and body temperature, those kind of things. The results of that
would tell you if this person's suited for that kind of role or not.

Alan: The amount of data we can
collect from this and share is incredible. It's not just about trying
to sell people more things, but if this data can be used to deliver
training in a more efficient, effective way, I think this is the
ultimate goal.

Sean: It sure is. And really the
still being in that early adopter, early majority phase and having
yet crossed that chasm to the later, mid later majority efficacy from
this training -- I think -- will mean everything, will be where it
becomes commonplace. So we found that we were over the years, got
good traction with the early adopters that we're most likely going to
adopt and integrate early technology no matter what. I think we're
moving into a little bit of that early majority, but I think for the
late majority to really catch on, you're going to need real efficacy
where it's-- you can prove it's saving lives, it's improved training,
you've saved a lot of money. And I think 2020 is a big year for that.
I think we're at that crossroad.

Alan: Yeah, I really, truly
agree with that. So you guys have been working diligently on building
out these scenarios and everything. What are some of the other ones
you've talked about? Fall protection, emergency response, gas
fitting. What are some of the other ones that you guys are working
on?

Well, in the very near future, where we
got some nice press coming out soon with some of the ones that we're
going to release, we have a first responder operations for hazmat,
where we have a spilled over gas tanker for firefighters. Now, the
way that we developed these, Alan, is, for instance, our hazard
recognition. We have hazard recognition, which are like OSHA
standards that would be in a warehouse, but because we've productized
that application, we could put hazard recognition on a construction
site, or in a hospital, or in a steel factory, or an automotive
factory. So we've productized the actual learning objective behind it
and then can very easily flip the environments to be address most
industries. So when I say we have hazard recognition, it's really
across multiple recognitions. We have the natural gas leak emergency
response that I spoke of already, fall protection, the inside meter
inspection that we spoke about already. Now, just to back up for one
second. The way that our platform works is our business model is we
go to market and distribute the content through VARs, or Value Added
Resellers. We've also developed on the front-end a content curation
side of the platform, that will allow other developers to monetize
their content through our reseller network. So through-- if you can
imagine that all the amazing content that's been developed and great
developers out there that don't have the sales side of things, our
library -- if you will -- our content side is going to increase
rapidly, as we bring these other developers on.

Alan: Amazing. That seems like a
scalable way to do it.

Sean: It is. I mean, we--
earlier on -- when I say earlier on, meaning the last couple of years
-- we learned that we had a hard time selling to first responders or
the construction companies or oil and gas company, because we didn't
know what the pain points were for that training. So partnering with
these resellers -- who understand the pain points -- are much better
at selling this training content into their industries. So that's why
on the sales side. And then we're obviously automating all that
through the platform.

Alan: Incredible. Where can
people find you? It's pixovr.com?

Sean: Yep, pixovr.com. We tend
to have presence at most of these different trade shows that we go
to, but pixovr.com is definitely the place.

Alan: I think this is something
that people will be listening, and the goal of this podcast is really
to educate business owners and business communities to invest and
start using this technology. So what would be the path for a new
customer? So let's say, for example, somebody is in -- I don't know
-- trucking, and they want to develop a trucking training. What is
the path for them to go from reaching out on your website, to having
the full thing delivered? What does that look like?

Sean: We would start by having a
conversation. First of all, is do we have the content that they're
looking for? Are there other developers that may have already the
content that they're looking for? And then we would most likely pair
them up with one of our resellers, that would know-- have much more
knowledge and education in in the trucking space -- in this scenario
-- to really help integrate. Because as you know, these business
owners are finding the value of VR and XR pretty quickly. It's easy
to put on a headset and go up 80 storeys and look over the edge and
say, "Wow, this is very impactful. This is game changing."
to actually integrating it into their business. So how does it fit
into their business model? Where do they put it? Who does the
training? Who trains? How many headsets? And through our resellers,
we answer a lot of those questions, because they've already done it,
they already know where to put it, they already know who maintains
it, what category it goes under. So we would be able to help not only
on the content side, but also on the integration side.

Alan: Integration side is
actually becoming one of those challenges that people-- it used to be
a technology problem. "Can we make this technology work? OK, now
it works. Can we can we make it do something we want? Okay, that
works. How do we get it out and how do we scale it in a reasonable
way?" That's the next step of it.

Sean: Over the years, we've been
faced with multiple problems, really just problem solving and
creating a product market fit, and integration sort of rose to the
top. The hardware is getting better. The people that [make] VR and
the knowledge of VR -- and XR -- is becoming more available. And then
without real strong efficacy, you can't have integration before
efficacy. So you have to integrate it. You have to start using it.
And so I think those problems -- like we said before -- will be
addressed. Not fully, but I think 2020 is looking bright.

Alan: Interesting. I agree with
you. I think now people are beyond that kind of shiny object syndrome
of VR at the beginning, and they're looking for real solutions. And
it's funny, because I've got your webpage open here and it's just a
video playing in the background. But you've got everything from a
warehouse fall, and fire trucks, and everything. It's really
incredible, the work you guys have done. And I think in 2020
companies are starting to realize the power of It. What about
numbers? When somebody says to you -- from a number standpoint --
this is going to cost X amount. What is my return? How do you deal
with those questions?

Sean: Well, I think it's a good
question, because that means that they have a use case, or they've
identified a pain point or a reason to use it. One of our clients
works with a very large auto manufacturer -- being here in Detroit,
obviously, that's in our backyard -- that we're sending engines
around the world, to train on the engines, replace the timing belt or
filter or something like that. So you can already see where the value
of VR is. Because we took the CAD of the engine model, and replicated
that and made it fully interactive and multi-participant. So they can
train the trainees or the technicians all around the world, without
having to send the engine out. So you could back into an ROI pretty
quickly. Well, how much does an engine cost? How much does an engine
cost to ship? How many were we shipping out? And then how much does a
standalone headset cost, and how much did the application cost? And
so you can see right there in that example of immediate ROI.

Alan: Yeah, absolutely.
Something that we've seen is in VR, you're creating these assets for
training. But those same assets can be also used for marketing or
different divisions. Are you seeing that? Because what we realized is
that usually one arm doesn't talk to the other, and there's very
little crossover there. But as you start suggesting these things
that, hey, you just spent X amount by making all these models of
these things for your training. Would this be something that they
could do into retail or marketing?

Sean: Well, you and I both know
that absolutely is possible.

Alan: The question isn't "Can
you?" It is "Do they?"

Sean: For VR/XR, all things
under this umbrella, any adoption is great. So early on, anyone that
was interested in it, we would work with them and try to license them
some content. Yes, though. The answer is yes. At a high level, that
it can be used-- and we are starting to promote it, because when they
look at costs for one department -- or one division, depending on how
large the company is -- then we try to promote them that you could
leverage this asset, get more out of it in different categories. Yes.

Alan: And it's interesting. We
tried to do that as well. But it's one of those things that-- they're
like, "Yeah, that's great. But dealing with the marketing
department is a whole different ball of wax." It's crazy.

Sean: It definitely is, yeah.
And a lot of innovation departments are the ones reaching out first.

Alan: Yeah, absolutely. Though
the problems you get with the innovation departments, they're
usually-- they want cutting edge things. And it ends up getting stuck
in pilots. They get a small budget for a pilot, and then they-- there
seems to be a disconnect between the innovation department of the
company, and actually deploying real solutions.

Sean: That's true. But I think
as we understand integration better and as we solve those problems,
we can help the innovation department. Because what we found was, we
did some projects with innovation departments and we didn't know
ourselves how they would integrate it and they certainly don't. So
the more we've learned, the more we lean on our reseller subject
matter experts, the better we're getting and the more traction we're
getting.

Alan: I guess one thing to
consider when we're doing this. You mentioned standalone headsets.
Clearly people want this. Clients are saying, "Hey, I want to
move to a standalone headset." But the tradeoff of fidelity
versus that, what are you guys seeing with, let's say the Oculus
Quest, for example?

Sean: Yeah. You know, it depends
also on the type of company. We work with insurance companies, where
they want to take 40 headsets and put them in the trunks of 40
different agents, and have them go on site on a construction site and
do this type of training. They're just not going to take a PC tether
based unit and throw it in their trunk and go set it up. So in that
scenario, the standalone, the Quest or other would work very well.
Where you have training facilities and you have the staff or the
employees trainees coming into that facility to train, then, of
course, a unit that's stationed and you could get that higher
quality. But we found that the quality on the standalone is
definitely suffice and outweighs the barrier. For instance, this
insurance company, they're just not going to do the other. So the
quality is definitely, definitely good enough.

Alan: Interesting. Wow. There's
so much to take in. We've got this this idea -- both of us have
thought about this a lot -- of how do we use this technology as
efficiently as possible. And one of the things that you mentioned --
which I think is similar to our business model as well, and we're
gonna have to talk offline on how to work together on this -- but
distributing the content through value added resellers, and also
reselling content. Because making quality VR content and AR content
is expensive, and being able to share those costs across multiple
companies seems like the only way to really grow the industry.

Sean: It is. That's definitely
something that's a little newer for us. We just are finishing some of
the tools within the platform that will be able to ingest other
content and then monetize it. We've created this ecosystem of taking
it from content development -- that we're not calling content
curation, because it could really come in a number of different ways
-- all the way through an end user license. So we feel like we've put
this ecosystem and this process together, and now just continue to
automate it through the tools. So whether it's other people's content
or we're developing our own content-- we even have tools that would
expedite the content development for other developers -- whether it
be randomization engine, multi-user engine, or art environment packs
-- that we would work with other developers to help expedite the
development if they didn't have existing content.

Alan: So what would that look
like from your standpoint, would there be a license fee or how would
that work?

Sean: We haven't monetized those
tools yet like that. We would rather just work with the developer to
help develop, because we're after the content. So we would work with
them on those licenses or even the use of those tools in order to get
these applications or the content. So we have resellers and their
clients that are currently looking for content. So if we would work
with other developers and provide these tools to help expedite
development. So in short, we don't have a toolkit that we license out
currently, but we would definitely work with other developers to use
those tools.

Alan: That's something that I
think is kind of one of those things in this XR industry. It seems
like everybody's willing to help each other, and that's an amazing
thing in an industry that we're still at the beginning. But I keep
saying this over and over again. This is not a net sum game. Our
industry is going to go from $10-billion to $500-billion in 10 years,
creating -- by PWC's estimate -- over $2-trillion in enterprise value
in the next 10 years. That's a lot of money to split, and there's not
a lot of companies working at the level of PIXO. And it's really
interesting to see that you're so open to working with everybody.
It's great.

Sean: Yeah, thanks. I definitely
think that there's room for everybody. I've yet to really-- when you
drill down and you have more of a sophisticated XR person looking
into it, I've really yet to find two or three companies or more that
are doing exactly the same thing. I feel like we all have our little
niche, a little bit here, a little bit there, and can leverage each
other and those attributes. Because in my opinion, the market really
needs to grow in the next year or two. Now is the time. I'd hate for
all of us--

Alan: Yeah, I agree. And that is
one of the reasons I started this podcast. One to learn personally,
but also to inspire and educate business leaders to invest in this
technology as fast as possible, because the more knowledge we get out
there. And if you look at the podcast, the way it works, it's done
and it's tagged by industry. So if somebody is interested in retail,
that's up in retail and there's all the things for them, and for
interest in the airlines, or training, or whatever it is.
Unfortunately, training comes up in pretty much everyone, because
that's the killer use case of VR. But what is one problem in the
world you want to see solved using XR technologies?

Sean: The one problem with 15
seconds to think about it, is I truly believe that exposing people,
trainees, people learning a different skill -- especially if it's
dangerous -- exposing them to that environment, whether you're a
doctor, or a construction worker, or firefighter before being in that
environment for real, whether it be crowd management, I think that
solving that problem or allowing someone to be exposed to a scenario,
before they actually have to go in it, will absolutely make the world
a better place.

Alan: Well, Sean, this has been
really, really a great interview and thank you. Is there any final
words you want to share with anybody?

Sean: So if there are developers
out there that have content -- or want to develop content -- are
interested in monetizing that, get a hold of us. Otherwise, I really
appreciate it, Alan. I look forward to following up and staying in
touch.

Alan: I will hit you up in
Detroit. Motor City, here we come!

Sean: Yes, sir.