PTC Advances Leadership in Industrial Augmented Reality with New Product Offerings and Acquisitions

BOSTON — (BUSINESS WIRE) — June 18, 2018 — PTC (NASDAQ: PTC) today announced at the sold-out LiveWorx^® 18 digital transformation conference a wide range of new initiatives for augmented reality (AR) coming out of its business unit dedicated to the advancement and application of augmented reality in industrial settings.

Augmented reality is one of the fastest growing segments of the technology market. AR superimposes digital information onto a person’s view of the physical world. For manufacturers, augmented reality can enhance all functions within the product lifecycle, including engineering, manufacturing, marketing, sales, operations, and service. The transformative nature of AR and the vast opportunities available to businesses embracing AR were recently highlighted in a Harvard Business Review article, co-authored by Harvard Business School Professor, Michael Porter, and PTC CEO, Jim Heppelmann.

“We saw the significant benefit augmented reality could have for enterprises years ago, and the market is beginning to catch up and embrace the potential as well. Our recent momentum and continued focus not only strengthens our leadership in this space, but also enables PTC to help companies unlock the potential of augmented reality across all kinds of environments and use cases more effectively,” said Jim Heppelmann, president and CEO, PTC. “Our dedicated augmented reality business unit enables us to sharpen our focus on the application of AR in industrial settings and create additional opportunities for businesses.”

Award-winning Technology and Top Talent Meet Under Vuforia Brand
The dedicated PTC augmented reality business unit combines top talent and award-winning technologies, including the Vuforia^® platform, the industry’s most advanced and widely adopted AR technology platform. PTC has leveraged Vuforia to expand the capabilities of its market-leading ThingWorx^® Industrial Innovation Platform, enabling customers to visualize, instruct, guide, and improve interactions with physical things.

PTC’s augmented reality portfolio includes:

• Vuforia Engine – enables users to develop powerful cross-platform AR applications
• Vuforia Studio (formerly ThingWorx Studio) – enables users to reuse 3D CAD content, incorporate step-by-step instructions and IoT data, and scale AR authoring and publishing in industrial enterprises
• Vuforia View (formerly ThingWorx View) – with this universal browser, users can consume Vuforia Studio-created content on phones and tablets running iOS, Android, and Windows, as well as digital eyewear like Microsoft HoloLens
• Vuforia Chalk™ – enables technicians to get remote assistance from experts
• Creo^® Design Share Solution – enables users to easily share Creo^® 3D CAD content in augmented reality with partners and other stakeholders

Annotations Come to Life with Availability of Vuforia Chalk for Industrial Use Cases
The service use case for augmented reality gets even more powerful with the commercial release of the Vuforia Chalk™ remote assistance app that empowers people to solve technical challenges faster by providing frontline technicians the instructions and guidance they need in real time. Vuforia Chalk combines advanced augmented reality technology with real-time video to connect a field technician with an expert so that the expert can see the situation in the field. The advanced computer vision technology in Vuforia Chalk uniquely enables users to draw digital annotations that accurately ‘stick’ to physical objects, allowing the expert to guide the technician through a process, step-by-step; even as a technician moves, a Vuforia Chalk annotation will remain anchored to its original location.

Commercial availability of Vuforia Chalk for iOS and Android devices begins today, with a free 30-day evaluation license available at chalk.vuforia.com. Additionally, an enhancement enabling the use of Vuforia Chalk in conjunction with Vuforia Studio is planned for Fall 2018.

Revolutionary Capability to Use AR for Training Added with Acquisition of Waypoint Labs
PTC recently acquired advanced AR technology from Waypoint Labs, an award-winning tech startup launched out of the MIT Media Lab. Waypoint™ software can chronicle the real-time movements of a person wearing an AR headset by monitoring the individual both audio-visually and spatially in three dimensions. It enables users to capture this information through a knowledge processing engine and convert it into any number of formats, including an interactive website with photos and videos, Microsoft Word documents with photos, or an interactive AR training where trainees wear a similar headset. Waypoint supports a variety of industrial use cases, such as enabling manufacturers to create and distribute service manuals and product documentation, and biotech labs to develop AR-powered standard operating procedures (SOPs) to improve quality and compliance.