>> Announcer: From The Computer History Museum
in Mountain View, California,
it's theCUBE On The Ground
with Accenture Labs' 30th anniversary celebration.
>> Welcome to a special CUBE On The Ground presentation
of our coverage of Accenture Labs' 30th birthday party.
They've been in business for 30 years.
Accenture is doing some great things
from here, 30 years ago, to the future.
Future's all about AI, blockchain, you name it,
virtual reality, augmented reality.
I'm John Furrier with theCUBE.
Our next guest is Joe Mikhail,
who's the chief revenue officer of a company called Meta.
Welcome to the conversation here
at the Accenture Labs party.
>> Thank you, John, and congratulations to Accenture.
>> They have this theme, Magical,
but really, it is a magical time.
At my age, I've been in this business long enough,
it's like I wish I was 20 again,
because the technology is really amazing.
Augmented reality, you guys do a lot of new stuff.
Tell us what your company does,
and you guys are doing some really cool stuff.
>> Absolutely.
We're really pioneering in augmented reality.
For those who don't really understand augmented reality,
it basically overlays digital data
and virtual optics in the real world.
With that comes, really,
a change in paradigm of what's possible.
Our forte is really in being a spatial interface company.
We're not only changing the fidelity
of the images you see in augmented reality,
but how you interface with them,
naturally based on neuroscience.
>> Joe, first, take a step back,
'cause a lot of folks here in Silicon Valley,
they all know what AR is, or augmented reality,
something analyst relations work.
But augmented reality is the big future.
I always say AI stands for, not artificial intelligence,
but augmented intelligence.
That's what software's doing.
What's your definition of augmented reality?
>> Augmented reality is the ability to
really change how man/machine interface
around information, objects outside of 2D panels,
and bringing the digital into our world.
>> Let's talk about your company, Meta.
You guys are doing some pretty cool stuff.
Your CTO's not here, which, we'll get him on theCUBE soon.
If you're watching, we'll get you on.
But there's some cool stuff going on around visualization.
I mean, we've covered big data since the day
Hadoop was born 2009, 2010 timeframe.
Visualization is key,
but now, when you go to the next level,
3D, holograms, this is the future.
The user interface is going to be augmented
at work or at play.
What are you guys doing?
>> Absolutely, many things
when it comes to data visualization.
First of all,
the third dimension, obviously adds a new way to see data,
so, obviously, everything going from a 2D data analysis,
you add a dimension,
that gives you, obviously, added productivity.
But in addition to that, you know, visualizing concepts.
Mind-mapping, being able to correlate ideas,
and not just data points.
And, again, product design cycles and so on,
productivity increases.
Thirdly, ideation.
Taking all that data,
getting a 3D model with all its complexity
into a simple form that we can collaborate around
and design.
>> You know, the next generation of users
that are coming through the system, if you will,
young kids, they're gamers.
They love graphics.
We're living in kind of a gaming culture, if you will,
not to say gaming, literally, but per se,
the interface is very rich in graphics,
very rich in data.
How is that going to impact CIOs?
'Cause they are looking at a old world of IT,
put the servers on the racks,
move the packets through the network.
Now they have an opportunity with mobile,
and now with global internet to put things out there
like AR, like blockchain, smart contracts, AI.
>> I think it's definitely an area
that all CIOs should be looking at today,
in many aspects.
Number one, just like mobile,
bring-your-own-device came into the office space.
There will be, obviously,
an impact from not just
productivity solutions in the office,
but as we get to consumer and AR,
dealing with that and the implications of that.
But, a more important, pressing issue for CIOs would be
the fact that this is the future of compute.
There is not a need anymore for 2D panels,
or in the near future for 2D panels
and keyboards and mouse interfaces,
and how does that change IT support
and, again, data sharing, collaboration, and all these--
>> And we see Siri, voice-activated,
that's pretty classic.
Throw the old movie Minority Report out there,
where you're using your hands out there in the 3D space.
This is an interface.
>> Yes, it truly is.
>> How real is that?
I mean, come on, tell us!
>> It's real, it's here, it's now.
You can get a demo today for the audience.
Soon, we can definitely invite you and get a demo.
It is here.
We're able to interact naturally today.
We're on second-generation product.
We have the widest field of view,
which truly gives you immersion.
You can walk around a hologram.
You can stretch a hologram.
You can surround yourselves with unlimited 3D images
and panels and windows.
>> So, what's the applications?
What does this mean for the typical person
out in the real world,
whether they work in an enterprise,
or a business, or a consumer?
>> Absolutely.
Early adopters right now are in business, enterprises.
High-ROI type of applications and product design,
so, rapidly iterating on concepts and ideas,
getting all the way to sales and marketing,
so once you have that design,
then, how can you sell it and demonstrate it.
All the way to maintenance, training, et cetera.
That's the early adopters.
Education is next, very close by.
In the near future, and then, of course,
we're thinking and trending towards consumers.
What does shopping look like in the future?
>> Check out Meta.
It's a cool company.
Now, Accenture Labs are having their party,
and Accenture's been around for a while.
I'm old enough to remember Arthur Andersen,
the Big Six accounting firms, Accenture Consulting.
These guys are not Johnny-come-latelies.
They're doing some cool stuff.
What's your role with Accenture Labs?
You're on a panel here at this event,
it's kind of a celebration.
They're bringing the magic to life,
talking about the magic of AI and cool things.
What are you guys doing here,
and what's Accenture Labs doing?
>> Yeah, absolutely.
We've been in collaboration with Accenture Labs
for a little while,
and it's been very, very exciting and productive.
Number one, we're aligned on vision and strategy,
so, currently, it's productivity.
We're supporting productivity,
we are going to develop a new platform,
and so, for example,
we've done a study together where we measured
basic instructions around a LEGO,
this was for the public,
around building a LEGO piece used in our headset,
using three-dimensional instructions versus 2D instructions,
and Accenture brought that magic
of quantifying productivity,
and it was proved to be 20% faster
with respect to instruction and training.
>> So, Accenture has some chops, here, technically.
>> Absolutely, absolutely.
They do.
(both laughing)
And in the future,
I mean, they're a big part of our ecosystem.
This is what we're an enabler.
We're a spatial interface--
>> What is the ecosystem for AI?
That's a good question,
'cause people want to know, like,
it's in a new, emerging area.
Young kids are going to love this.
New software development's coming in.
What does the ecosystem look like in this new AR area,
and what's the hiring profile?
>> Yeah, that's a good question.
Let me focus on ecosystem.
I would say 50% of our current customers are developers,
so the development community is adopting AR
and they're building some really interesting
and cool things.
But the ecosystem comes from developers' content,
so there's a lot of content developers,
you know, high-fidelity 3D models.
Enterprises are consuming all of this,
and then channel partners,
system integrators such as Accenture
that are seeing the opportunity and bridging that gap
for a lot of our corporate customers
that are still forming their strategies.
>> Joe Mikhail here, the chief revenue officer of Meta.
I got to ask you,
what percentage of your employees and customers are gamers?
High amount, medium, low?
Got to be a lot of gamers.
>> There are some.
Obviously, we integrate with Unity.
A lot of our developers have come from that world,
but our customers, we're a productivity company,
and all of our customers are corporates at this time.
Of course, we're interested to see
what gamers can do on our platform.
>> What's the low-hanging fruit for enterprise
with respect to AR,
because this is the question.
No one debates the future.
They see some augmentation coming on,
obviously wearables, things of that nature,
but software's going to power it all.
What is the use case for enterprise?
What's the low-hanging fruit?
>> The lowest-hanging fruit is 3D CAD visualization
in the product design cycle.
That's just the lowest-hanging fruit right now.
And then, training and education.
>> You guys excited?
>> We are very, very excited.
The market's huge.
>> All right, final question for you.
For the folks that don't know the AR world,
what is the future of AR going to be?
What's the impact on society,
what's the impact on daily lives of people
with augmented reality?
>> I think there are many, many impacts.
One of our core values is technology serving humanity,
so for us, it's very important to remove the barriers
of devices coming between you and me,
and being able to just look up content directly
and interact with that.
I think that's going to change how we think,
how we collaborate,
and then, of course, life sciences is huge,
so there's a lot of companies starting
to look at the future operating system,
and the empathy that could come between
a doctor and a patient looking at a case
instead of just talking, you know?
>> Joe, great, thanks for coming on.
I'll give you a quick last word, here.
What are you guys looking for as a company?
You hiring, what's the strategy, what's the plan?
Give a quick soundbite for what you guys are doing.
>> Absolutely.
We're growing.
The market demand is huge, and we are hiring.
We're looking for engineering,
smart engineers that are interested in the space.
We are growing on the sales and marketing side.
We are absolutely interested in being part of our family,
but I would say the biggest interest
is in ecosystem partnerships.
>> How long are you around for?
>> Five years.
Congratulations, Accenture Labs, 30 years celebration,
where all the magic's happening, that's the theme.
They got a magic show.
We couldn't get video of that.
They wouldn't let us record it.
Joe from Meta, chief revenue officer,
thanks for sharing your insight here on theCUBE.
Appreciate it.
>> Thanks, John.
>> There'll be more coverage here
at Accenture Labs' next 30 years.
This is theCUBE coverage.
We'll be right back.
Thanks for watching.
(upbeat music)