Industrial Metaverse Potential in the Global NDT Industry

The Impact of the Top 3 Strategic Imperatives on the Industrial Metaverse for Non-destructive Testing Industry

Transformative Mega Trends

Why:

• The growing emphasis on improving worker safety and enhancing inspection efficiency will continue to drive the adoption of digital technologies such as AR/VR, AI/ML, digital twins, and industrial metaverse.

Frost Perspective:

• Industrial metaverse will feature in the digital transformation roadmap of several non-destructive testing (NDT) industry participants over the next 2 to 3 years.
• Through a metaverse platform, experts from different geographic locations can collaborate.

Internal Challenges

Why:

• Change management will remain a key challenge to adopting the industrial metaverse in the NDT industry.
• Inadequate IT infrastructure and data security require considerable financial commitment which will deter industrial metaverse adoption.

Frost Perspective:

• NDT companies use AR/VR for training, digital twins for simulations, and AI for asset health monitoring and enhancing inspection efficiencies.
• Several start-ups that offer value propositions by leveraging NDT data will emerge in the next 1 to 3 years.

Innovative Business Models

Why:

• Increased inclination towards data-driven business models is evident with growing digitalization.
• NDT companies will likely offer service-based business models, such as inspection-as-a-service and predictive maintenance services.

Frost Perspective:

• Companies will develop an ecosystem by offering developers to create applications and services. This will foster a culture of innovation.
• Pay-per-use or other subscription methods are expected to be used to provide training services.

Growth Drivers

• Industrial metaverse technologies, such as AR/VR and MR, enable remote inspection capabilities. Remote inspections will allow workers to inspect inaccessible locations with ease, enhancing worker safety and reducing costs.
• The industrial metaverse provides an immersive training experience because employee training and upskilling is a key aspect of the NDT industry. The ability to mimic different inspection procedures and provide an understanding of realistic challenges, interactive learning, and remote learning augments growth prospects.
• Aiding collaboration between organizational silos, the industrial metaverse fosters the collaboration of personnel from different geographies or disciplines. This will result in the generation of new ideas that can be tested virtually before being taken to production.

Growth Restraints

• High costs will be a key deterring factor to fast industrial metaverse adoption. These costs include infrastructure investments, upskilling, and recruiting new talent capable of understanding and working with the latest technologies.
• Skill shortages are a key issue in the NDT industry with the existing workforce reaching retirement age. Moreover, the advent of Industry 4.0 is creating new skill gaps. The dearth of personnel with relevant expertise will impede the adoption of the industrial metaverse.
• Interoperability with existing systems will be a key issue with industrial metaverse adoption. Industry standards around standardizing data formats, interfaces, and data security will be key to addressing this.