A Kiwi startup is revolutionising education and workplace training with virtual reality

This weekend I had the opportunity to meet Henry Lane, Corvecto managing director.

Corvecto is a Kiwi startup that works with enterprise organisations of all sizes looking to protect themselves or grow their business through virtual and augmented reality.

Corvecto provides full-stack design and development services.

They distinguish themselves by leveraging half a decade of experience in creating virtual worlds for global entertainment brands and professional organisations.

Before this meeting, I thought of virtual reality as simply the newest fad in the entertainment industry, however, after an hour with Henry and his VR programs my mind was blown away at the potential of this technology.

After a quick chat about Corvecto, I jumped into the VR headset and experienced a series of simulations.

Three, in particular, stood out to me, the x-ray machine, commercial factory and virtual observatory.

The x-ray machine built with Virtual Medical Coaching put me in the shoes of a technician and I was tasked with taking an x-ray of a virtual patient's foot.

The simulation was incredibly life-like and fully involved, I had to do everything from positioning the patient's foot to operating the machinery.

I was completely taken back by the potential this technology has for education.

VR can be used to simulate surgeries, emergency response events and other dangerous environments that students need to be able to interact with in order to get their degree.

VR helps minimize the risk of these situations while giving students plenty of hands-on experience before moving on to the real thing.

The commercial factory showed off a 3D recreation of a production facility, this has enormous implications for enterprise businesses who need to show off their facilities to foreign investors.

The VR headset means that investors can walk around a facility and investigate every nook and cranny.

This simulation also proves that this technology is immensely useful for architecture and facility planning as companies can plan and create structures then walk around them to get a sense of what they would look like in real life.

The third simulation that took my breath away was the virtual observatory built for Tekapo's Earth - Sky, this program takes users on a virtual tour of the New Zealand night sky.

Users can see the constellations being drawn out in real time, get up close to planets and my favourite part, be pulled out into space.

There is something immensely beautiful about looking down at earth and then moving even further away to look down at the entire solar system.

It makes you realise just how small we are, an experience traditionally reserved for astronauts.

Lane says, "An AR world is three years off, we want to make sure that we are prepared for that reality."

I am inclined to agree with him, it is important for NZ to keep investing in VR technology and the extraordinary benefits it presents across the spectrum.

You can check out one simulation here: