Quick take:
- The University of Houston (UH) has announced its entry into the metaverse race.
- The Texas-based educational institution joins a growing list of learning centres foraying into the metaverse.
- UH has collaborated with AI Innovation Consortium, Nvidia and TechnipFMC to build an industrial metaverse.
The University of Houston (UH) has jumped on the metaverse train as it looks to build an industrial metaverse. The Houston, TX-based learning institution has collaborated with AI Innovation Consortium, Nvidia and TechnipFMC for the project.
UH is joining a growing list of educational centres that have forayed into the metaverse. In July Wharton became the first Ivey League Business School to launch a course dedicated to educating learners about the metaverse opportunity. Wharton’s announcement came just days after the University of Tokyo launched study programs in the metaverse.
Notably, Wharton’s program is about the metaverse, while the University of Tokyo is teaching regular programs in the metaverse.
In the University of Houston’s case, non of the two verticals apply. The institution is teaming up with leading technology companies to create products for the industrial metaverse.
The industrial metaverse is a virtual program that leverages emerging technologies like AR and VR to facilitate the remote monitoring and assessment of projects.
Microsoft is one of the leading players in this space, having already teamed up with the likes of Kawasaki and Kraft Heinz to facilitate the development of new products and supply chain monitoring. The company also launched a metaverse-based drone training program for the US army.
UH, Nvidia and others are teaming up to “advance the creation of industrial metaverse applications as part of the digital oilfield laboratory initiative,” UH wrote in a press release.
The companies want to build commercially variable use cases of the industrial metaverse.
In an industrial metaverse, people use extended reality glasses to run industrial systems virtually from a remote workshop.
“This collaboration brings together end-users, technology providers, and domain experts to build commercially relevant use cases and accelerator tools and breakthrough informational silos. These resources ultimately enable an interconnected world with an industrial metaverse,” the companies wrote.
Adam Berg, Manager of Learning Solutions at TechnipFMC who has already worked with UH College of Technology and AI Innovation Consortium, to run a pilot program for upstream resource management commented:
“The purpose of the XR Network is to bring together the knowledge, tools, and people necessary to leverage XR technologies, to achieve business goals, and to transform industry environments. Our work with the college and the consortium has enabled us to move beyond concept to pilot and implementation.”
Nvidia has launched its own metaverse developer kit dubbed Omniverse, which, among other technologies, offers NVIDIA DGX™ systems, the NVIDIA Jetson™ edge AI platform, and NVIDIA OVX to accelerate the development process.
Commenting on the new partnership, NVIDIA’s Global Energy Director, Marc Spieler said: “Our work with the AI Innovation Consortium and its ecosystem of partners and members is enabling the critical collaboration required between academic research, technology, and industry to scale artificial intelligence to achieve measurable outcomes in industries like energy and manufacturing.”
“Using NVIDIA platforms like Omniverse and Modulus for digital twins and physically accurate simulations will accelerate and streamline returns on digital investments by reducing downtime and safety incidents,” Spieler added.
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