a booth throughout the conference , which drove significant interest in Sprout as a tool for academic research labs .
The day after CHI , the Immersive Experiences Lab hosted an all-day summit at HP for a select group of “ VIP ” guests from academia . The summit included a tour of the Customer Welcome Center , presentations from key HP technologists , and invited talks from the distinguished guests . The sessions included a live demo of the ShareTable application ( pictured below ), which uses Sprout to connect people across distances more effectively . By the end of the summit , the professors and students who attended had a clear understanding of why HP is uniquely poised to deliver on the promise of a Blended Reality future .
Understanding people to drive business value
The members of the Immersive Experiences Lab understand the value of being connected to the latest developments in the academic world . However , they also understand how to help HP succeed by applying radical ideas and cutting-edge techniques on the job . Patents and publications are important products from an industry research lab . But the Lab also works with HP business units to drive results .
What makes this Lab special is the focus on people first . Rather than starting with a promising technology and finding applications for it , the members of the Immersive Experiences Lab ask questions about how and why real people might benefit from new tools , new interactions , and new devices .
Members of the lab work in ShareTable to collaborate using HP Sprout
14 Innovation Journal · Issue 4 · Fall 2016
Working with data in virtual reality , coming soon to a desk near you !
This means asking lots of “ how ” and “ why ” questions that illuminate interesting habits and beliefs , rather than asking “ what ” people might want to incorporate into their lives .
Importantly , researchers in the Lab conduct studies in the real world . They investigate how real people live their lives in all of their messy glory . Again , by starting with people and their practices , the Immersive Experiences Lab determines how technology can improve the lives of people around the world . As researcher and Lab member Mithra Vankipuram says , “ We need to get out there , get our hands dirty , and really understand how people deal with all these technologies . We want to know how people handle it all .”
This is what it looks like to “ design for innovation .” It requires empathy for real people , their real-world challenges , and how to resolve their pain points in innovative yet useful ways . It also takes years of experience to develop the sensitive observation skills required to translate information into insights . Basically , it takes a lot of hard work .
Exploring the “ wacky edge ”
As a result of placing so much importance on people first , the Immersive Experiences Lab is pushing the boundaries of what an industry research lab can study . The lab operates at the “ wacky edge ” of how humans and technology will coexist in the future . And it is certainly true that some Lab projects are quite unique .
For example , members of the Immersive Experiences Lab are currently exploring everything from new content creation tools in virtual reality to kinetic jewelry that can crawl across your clothing . This Lab has brought together an exceptional team of people who have the skills to answer this question , even in the context of jewelry that can crawl up your sleeve . But the Lab remains focused on a central question : “ How could this idea improve people ’ s lives ?”
Defining three areas of focus
The Lab leadership wrangles all of this potential chaos by focusing the team on three topic areas . The first area is “ Shaping Future Experiences ,” which is all about exploring next-generation interfaces and interactions with technology . For example , people are using so-called “ chat bots ” in a variety of ways today . Slack is popular partly because