AR: MOVING THE REAL WORLD

MG Motor India’s studio in Bengaluru’s Residency Road is unique. It is small, just 500 sq. ft., and possibly one of the very few car showrooms in India without a car. Instead, it uses augmented reality (AR) tools to give potential customers the feel of MG cars. The customers get to customise technical aspects such as variant, transmission and fuel type, and even define the look and feel of the vehicle with over 70 accessories. “Traditional retail, due to spatial restrictions, cannot achieve such hyper-personalisation. This enhanced engagement will translate into increased conversion of enquiries into sales, better profitability and higher productivity. The dealers can minimise operational expenditures as they don’t have to manage inventory,” says Gaurav Gupta, Chief Commercial Officer, MG Motor India.

MG Motor is a small example of what is turning out to be a huge trend – use of AR by industries as diverse as oil & gas (HPCL/GAIL), manufacturing (Schneider Electric), real estate (Lodha Group) and retail (Urban Ladder, Pepperfry) to run plants efficiently, build/design projects, sell things and even carry out routine