Agenda

Description

The hiring race for top XR talent reached a pivotal turning point. Tech giants are all hiring thousands of top talent at unprecedented salaries and benefits. "Metaverse" Job listings increased 10x compared to last year. Competing for tech talent is not just an HR challenge anymore. It is a matter of survival when the XR tech capabilities of companies are at stake.

Topics to be discussed:
• Challenges of recruiting experienced and diverse XR dev teams
• Key XR tech skills and tools to look out for
• Building a strategic XR talent pipeline
• How to formulate benefits packages and salary levels to retain talent?
• How to hire game dev/designer into enterprise roles?
• What’s the secret sauce behind building strong XR teams?

Speakers

Kavya Pearlman

Founder & CEO , XR Safety Initiative

Ferhan Ozkan

CEO , XR Bootcamp

Brandon Samuel

Public Policy Recruiting Manager , Meta

Description

The metaverse is enabling us to explore new horizons of inclusivity across every sector. We have the opportunity and the responsibility to build a safe online space with radical inclusive principles at its core. No longer defined by the physical space we can create bespoke experiences that reflect audiences' needs and create a technology led equitable future, whilst keeping these spaces safe for all.
Featuring two leading experts from the UK cultural and academic sectors, this talk will draw on a range of international projects in which they have played vital roles. Asking questions and providing practical solutions to how the metaverse can act as a catalyst to rethink our shared future, and how embracing new technologies can encourage fresh perspectives, future thinking, and a radical approach to inclusion and access.
Takeaways:
• How utilising the metaverse can benefit telling cultural narratives.
• What can we expect from the next generation of experiences, festivals, and events?
• How do we meaningfully address the challenge of making content that is truly inclusive?
• Offer practical solutions to inclusivity and safety in the metaverse.

Speakers

Helen Davies

Research Fellow , University of South Wales

Description

360 XR gaming technology is immersive, inner-active, and at the very least cool. It is the main driver of the metaverse industry. Immersive VR Video and VR Filmmaking is a huge departure from traditional filmmaking. Come learn from this panel how they capture reality “as real as it is” and tell their stories in a 3D Metaverse. VR as a medium, has the ability to transport the mind without ever having to leave the comfort of your own home. With this comes a great ethical responsibility for anyone creating in the VR Metaverse.

Join us for a provocative and engaging conversation as we discuss the elements of storytelling as it applies to VR; how VR can expand your brand; and the responsibility that falls to all of us given the ethical concerns that are innate with the technology.

Speakers

Hugh Hou

Co-Founder / Head of XR , CreatorUp

Karen X. Cheng

Director , Karen X LLC

Michael Shabun

VP, Marketing and Business Development , Insta360

Keeley Turner

Executive Producer for VR Content , CreatorUp

Description

With customer buying preferences shifting to virtual with high regard for convenience, comfort, and hygiene, enterprises across the globe must be ready to keep up with the pace of immersive transformation. Join us as we uncover the Metaverse playbook for the enterprise of the future, delving into how they can provide immersive experiences and an omnichannel connected journey to their customers while building a robust recommendation and retargeting engine for personalization. We’ll go deep into the following 4 critical aspects of leveraging Metaverse to drive immersive transformation:

• Invest in building high-quality 3D assets for your products.
• Create an immersive, scalable, and compatible product experience for all smartphones, utilizing those assets.
• Integrate the immersive experience with omnichannel touchpoints and the sales pipeline(LMS & CRM) for a connected customer journey
• Rely on the right set of metrics to track and drive continuous innovation in customer experience and build a better marketing funnel.

We’ll also share our own experience from working with large enterprises, solving for their entire workflow and the disruptions & differentiation they witnessed.

Speakers

Prashant Sinha

Co-Founder & CRO , Metadome

Description

Marco Tempest specializes in developing immersive experiences of future technologies. Taking ideas about advanced technology, how we might interact with it, and finding innovative ways to bring those concepts alive. In his keynote presentation for AWE USA 2022 he will debut ultraportable real-time virtual production techniques, storytelling, gestural sensing and swarm robotics to give us a glimpse of a delightful augmented future right now.

Speakers

Marco Tempest

Creative Technologist , NASA Jet Propulsion Labratory

Description

It is argued that the metaverse isn’t here yet, but the tools and foundational technologies exist to create what we imagine the metaverse might one day be: an interconnected spatial web of mixed reality and fully digital worlds that are persistent, interoperable, and social, with rich economic structures and diverse cultures.

On this panel, we’ll hear from some of the leading voices in this space, who are providing the tools, and technologies, or pushing the creative limits of what is possible in our mission to make the metaverse. We’ll talk about accessibility, challenges, design choices, tools, where we are on the timeline of making the metaverse, and where it’s all heading.

Speakers

Melodie Mousset

Co-founder & Creative director , Patch XR

Betty Fink

Content Manager and XR Consultant , Spinning Top Music

Anne McKinnon

Cofounder & CEO , Ristband

Description

After a full house presentation at AWE 2017 our team will return with new hands free 3D user interfaces for XR headsets using the eyes alone. For the first time we will give insight into our technology and explain how eye-vergence based 3D interaction was achieved and why it is as significant for XR headsets as the touch screen for smart phones.

During the presentation we will demonstrate on the latest XR headsets how users can interact in their forward visual space e.g. pick up, move, rotate 3D content using binocular eye vergence movements without having to engage other objects e.g. controllers or display elements. In summary we will have a deep dive into hands free 3D user interfaces using the eyes alone and share how it is useful in consumer and enterprise environments.

Speakers

Botond Bognar

CEO , Pillantas Inc.

Description

A wonderfully exciting opportunity is upon us to utilize the tools of virtual reality to change the current educational paradigm. Daniel and Angelina will be asking each other questions regarding the critical considerations of mass adoption of virtual reality within teaching and learning.
Dr Angelina Dayton, senior Virtual Reality Research Scientist at Virtual World Society has put over 30,000 first time users into a headset. Daniel Dyboski-Bryant' organisation - Educators in VR - has delivered over 3,000 virtual workshops, talks and sessions.

Speakers

Angelina Dayton

Executive Director , Virtual World Society

Daniel Dyboski-Bryant

Founder , Virtual World Society

Description

Join us in an authentic panel discussion with three CEO’s leading the Immersive Tech Landscape. The focus will be on the current trajectory of immersive media, and where we are headed. As Founders, how has the landscape of VR changed from the previous years? What is the latest thinking on the current ecosystem? These CEO’s will share perspectives on team-building and what it takes to develop a highly-driven team working on forward-thinking products. They will speak to how to ideate and build for the Metaverse using the tools available and deep-dive into what it really takes to build out an application for consumer and enterprise use.

Speakers

Katherine Bachert

Developer Strategy Team , Meta

Inga Petryaevskaya

Founder and CEO , ShapesXR

Emilie Joly

CEO , Zoe Immersive Inc

Inga Petryaevskaya

Founder and CEO , ShapesXR

Anurupa Ganguly

CEO , Prisms

Description

How do we make compelling and desirable XR experiences for the diverse needs of XR users? User experience (UX) research can identify the direction and accelerate the path towards this goal. But UX research in XR faces new challenges compared to traditional media. What are they and how can UX professionals help solve them? This panel invites UX experts from Academia, Magic Leap, Meta, and Microsoft to share why and how UX research can solve difficult and unique problems in XR, from identifying the target users to iterating and evaluating solutions that may not exist in full form when the data is needed to inform decisions. They will focus on how they have tailored User-Centered Design methodologies for XR, why and how multiple disciplines need to collaborate to make successful XR experiences, and other related topics. If you are interested in finding out how UX research can help your product, come join us in the panel.

Speakers

Joelle Zimmermann

Lead Scientist, User Research , Magic Leap

Yan Xu

UX Research Scientist , Meta Reality Labs

Thom Gable

Senior User Researcher , Microsoft

Zhen Bai

Assistant Professor , University of Rochester

Marina Kuznetsova

Principal User Research Manager , Microsoft

Danny Carson

Sr Director , Magic Leap

Travis Bowles

User Experience Research Manager - Hardware , Meta

Description

Products to support hybrid workplace communication,
collaboration and co-presence are driving the adoption of Extended Reality (XR) and immersive technologies. In this session, Ashley Coffey will share themes from PEAT’s “Inclusive XR in the Workplace” white paper, and share resources from community efforts to make XR and immersive technologies accessible to people with disabilities. Meryl Evans will share her lived experience, perspectives, and practices that can be used to help ensure that immersive collaboration technologies are designed with disability inclusion in mind.

Speakers

Ashley Coffey

Emerging Technologies Lead, Partnership on Employment & Accessible Technology (PEAT) , PEAT

Meryl Evans

Accessibility & Marketing Consultant , XR Access

Description

Incorporation of 3D assets into the e-commerce customer experience has a significant positive impact. Customers are more likely to purchase products represented by 3D assets, and less likely to return them, because they have a much better idea of what to expect in real life.

Khronos Group's 3D Commerce Working Group was founded to remove barriers to deploying 3D in e-commerce at the industrial scale. By extending Khronos’s glTF standards asset format, creating 3D authoring guidelines and tools, and certifying 3D viewer, this group is working to enable the seamless design, manufacture, and presentation of 3D products.

In this session, experts from a variety of 3D asset providers share how they're working to create a single 3D object that offers value to stakeholders at every stage of product development. Learn how new hybrid working realities are driving the need for fully digital product development workflows. Discover current gaps in the pipeline as well as how to balance requirements for performance, portability, fidelity, and web accessibility. Find out how to incorporate shopping behaviors into the design process, so the same object interactivity features can benefit both product designers and consumers.

Speakers

Paul Duffy

President & Chairman , NexTech AR Solutions

Yehiel Atias

CEO & Co-Founder , Hexa3D

Tyler Lindberg

Lead, Vertebrae 3D Engineering , Snap, Inc.

Ashley Crowder

CEO, Co-Founder , VNTANA

Murad Akhter

Co-Founder & CTO , ALL3D

Description

Mixed reality wearables are coming, and with it an opportunity to turn users into protagonists in their own interactive story. Casting the user as the role of lead character poses many narrative, technical, and usability challenges that have never before needed to be solved. This new form of entertainment will be prolific and provide opportunity for a new generation of storytellers.

Through invention, prototyping, and iteration, we created Forensic Detective, an immersive augmented reality experience that rose to number 2 in entertainment in the App store.

Join Brett Bagenstose, Principal and self titled “Baron of Pixels” of NeoPangea along with Kris Soumas, Director, Content Strategy & Partnerships of Verizon Consumer Group, for a fascinating glimpse into the world of immersive storytelling through AR, and find out how you can tap this new resource to make your own story come to life in a whole new way.

Speakers

Kristen Soumas

Dir., Consumer Content Partnerships , Verizon

Brett Bagenstose

Principal , NeoPangea

Description

Please join us for Happy Hour from 5:30 – 6:45pm inside the Hall D - Playground, connected to the Expo Hall.

Come network and enjoy the spectacular experiences provided by some AWE-some XR companies. Enjoy a cocktail and some light snacks too.

Sponsored by Varjo.

Description

Outlets located throughout the Convention Center & Hyatt. Food available for purchase.

Description

Outlets located throughout the Convention Center & the Hyatt. Food available for purchase. Credit card sales only.

Description

Please join us for the Welcome Party from 6:00 – 8:00pm at the Hyatt Regency Santa Clara Terra Courtyard (poolside), located just outside of the Hyatt Regency hotel lobby.

Wind down after a busy first day and enjoy a 'Zappar-ol Spritz' and light snacks.

Sponsored by Zappar.

Description

Join us as startups pitch to our panel of judges for a chance to be named AWE's "Startup to Watch" for 2022. The winner will be announced at the Auggie Awards ceremony.

Judges for the Start-Up Pitch competition are Dave Haynes, Tipatat Chennavasin, Pearly Chen, and Kristina Serafim.

Speakers

Jenny Xu

CEO , Talofa Games

Dan Furman

CEO , Arctop

Timothy Porter

CTO , Mod Tech Labs Inc.

Pearly Chen

VP Business Dev. , HTC Vive

Alex Porter

CEO , Mod Tech Labs Inc.

Alex Westner

Founder / CEO , Xander

Kristina Serafim

Managing Director , Verizon Ventures

Yolanda Barton

Founder , Revere XR

Dave Haynes

Partner , FOV Ventures

Jonathan Nowak Delgado

CEO and Co-Founder , Spree Interactive

Aldo Petruzzelli

CEO/Co-founder , Aequilibrium

Noah Robinson

Founder & CEO , Innerworld

Tipatat Chennavasin

General Partner , The Venture Reality Fund