At the beginning of April, our colleague Thomas Steinmetz tested the Apple Vision Pro at our American subsidiary EBF Inc. In addition to the many advantages and potentially exciting application scenarios, we criticised the few management options and the low level of UEM support at the time, which makes it difficult to use it securely in companies.
This may soon change, Apple announced at WWDC.
Short recap advantages & disadvantages of Apple Vision Pro
What are the advantages?
We were impressed by the intuitive use and quick immersion in the virtual world. As usual with Apple devices, you quickly find your way around and operation is simple. Thanks to several cameras, sensors and microphones, the device reacts amazingly quickly and makes operation by eye, voice and gestures easy. Because users can still see their own arms, hands and, if desired, parts of their surroundings, a certain connection to the physical world is maintained. A clear advantage of the Apple Vision Pro is that you can decide for yourself to what extent the real and virtual worlds merge. The fact that the virtual world has an impressive resolution and minimal latency makes it exciting for many areas of application – because delays or inaccuracies can sometimes have dangerous consequences, especially in moving environments.
While the display quality is an advantage, the current size of the device is a disadvantage for many professional environments. Large and not at all lightweight, it largely transports users into an isolated space. This can work in organised environments, such as offices, but in production halls and warehouses it could lead to challenges if you are not aware of what is going on around you. In addition, the device needs to be charged after just 2 hours if you can’t use it in wired mode.
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In addition to the functions, however, something else is essential for the corporate context: devices must be manageable.
WWDC announcement on management
Of interest for the secure use of Apple Vision Pro in companies was the announcement that there will be further management options:
Automated Device Enrollment will also be available for the glasses in future. Apps can be distributed and managed in the same way as with iPhones, iPads and Macs. In addition, visionOS 2.0 generally supports most of the configurations and payloads familiar from other Apple operating systems – such as the passcode policy. However, as the camera plays a completely different role in Apple Vision Pro, some restrictions are not implemented 1:1. For example, the background is not recorded when a screenshot is taken.
The APIs are open – now the question is when the UEM providers will upgrade their systems. It remains exciting!
WWDC announcement for new application scenarios
The Apple Vision Pro is now also available in Germany, and new functions and application scenarios will also soon be released.
New enterprise APIs will soon allow apps to access the main camera and enable automatic scanning of QR and barcodes as well as a superimposition of the real environment and application windows. This allows an engineer repairing a machine to see in the live screen which components are defective, while experts at other locations support him or her and see the surroundings and relevant information.
Conclusion
The fields of application are therefore becoming broader and modern working environments with cross-location networking or collaboration are also being considered. However, while the purchase of the Apple Vision Pro requires a high investment, it is pleasing that its use will be possible in the future thanks to new management options.
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