Recon Instruments

Recon Instruments Inc.

Type	Private
Industry	Technology, Heads-up Display (HUD)
Founded	Vancouver, BC, Canada (January 17, 2008)
Founder(s)	Dan Eisenhardt, Hamid Abdollahi, Fraser Hall, Darcy Hughes
Headquarters	Recon Labs, Vancouver, Canada
Area served	N. America, Europe, Japan, Australia
Website	ReconInstruments.com

Recon Instruments is a Canadian technology company which introduced the world’s first Heads-up Display (HUD) products to a consumer market. The company has developed HUD solutions which provide hands-free performance stats, navigation and communications information, direct-to-eye, in real-time.

History

Recon Instruments HUD technology was born in September 2006 from an integrated MBA project undertaken by co-founders Dan Eisenhardt, Hamid Abdollahi, Fraser Hall and Darcy Hughes, at the University of British Columbia, Sauder Robert H. Lee Graduate School.

Recon Instruments incorporated in January 2008, operating from the small office lab spaces rented from the University of British Columbia. In April 2010, the company moved to its current headquarters in Yaletown, Vancouver, where the team is led by CEO Dan Eisenhardt and CTO Hamid Abdollahi.

Discovery & Prototyping

Recon’s co-founders originally looked into developing a HUD product for swimming, with the intent to provide performance information direct-to-eye. Eisenhardt, a competitive swimmer, believed swimmers would value this information as a replacement for the clock at the side of the pool. It was at this point that he and his fellow founders developed the idea while studying at the University of British Columbia. However, a patent already existed for the swimming goggles and challenges with a small form factor and operating conditions of the technology proved too difficult an entry point, which led the team to refocus on a snow sports product – transforming their previous idea.

With 90% of the alpine sports market already wearing goggles, the founders realized the market potential for incorporating Heads-up Display’s, a technology initially developed for military and aviation use to present data without requiring pilots and soldiers to look away from their usual viewpoints, into ski goggles. The co-founders then went about turning this school project into a consumer electronics device, distributed globally in November 2010. In this time, the team went through the prototyping process miniaturizing the form factor to create a microcomputer with a micro LCD whilst optimizing battery life in extreme weather conditions.

Transcend

In November 2010, the first commercial snow HUD from Recon Instruments was launched in partnership with boutique eyewear brand Zeal Optics. The HUD was incorporated in goggles custom-made by Zeal. Within three months, Zeal had sold out of its initial production run of Transcend.

Transcend was announced as the most awarded product at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, which included Recon Instruments’ Heads-up Display product being presented with the coveted Best of Innovations Design and Engineering Award.

Features

Transcend was the first pair of goggles in the world to provide real-time performance feedback to the user while they ski or snowboard. Displayed on an LCD screen via a graphical user interface, Transcend instantly transmits the user's speed, longitude/latitude, altitude, vertical distance travelled, total distance travelled, temperature and time, direct-to-eye. All features are controlled by buttons formed into the frame of the goggles. A USB port and data transfer capabilities allowed the user to upload the data recorded by the HUD to Recon's post processing software, Recon HQ.

MOD & MOD Live / Recon Ready

Whereas Transcend is purchased with the HUD technology pre-installed into the frame of the goggles made by Zeal Optics, the second generation of Recon’s HUD technology, MOD and MOD Live, are sold separately from the goggles. The HUDs were engineered to retro-fit into specific goggles, known as Recon Ready goggles.

Features

Brand Partners

Developing a modular HUD product meant that Recon Instruments could offer a wider selection of goggles from various brand partners. In November 2011, Uvex, Alpina, and Briko joined Zeal as partners of Recon Instruments. These brand partners engineered and manufactured specific Recon Ready goggles for the MOD and MOD Live HUDs, while Zeal continued to pre-install the HUDs into their goggles. Partnering with third party goggle companies ensured the technology remained both wearable and fashionable.

In January 2012, Smith Optics and Scott Sports were announced as goggle partners. Like Zeal, Smith Optics developed a goggle with the HUD technology pre-installed, while Scott Sports followed the Recon Ready model. Following this, in November 2012, Oakley was named as a partner and the two companies co-developed the Oakley Airwave goggle, sold in Apple and Oakley store worldwide.

Remote

Recon Instruments was among the first companies in the world to adopt Bluetooth Low Energy. This Bluetooth wireless radio technology has been employed to connect the remote to MOD and MOD Live in a battery efficient way. The remote allows the user to easily scroll through the HUD’s user interface with gloves on.

Engage

Engage completes Recon’s ecosystem. Recon’s HUDs not only provide information direct-to-eye but also allows the user to re-live and share those experiences via the Engage platform. The Engage smartphone app and PC/Mac software allows users to upload their alpine trips, overlaid on Google mapping imagery, so that they can review, interact and share those trips on social networks. Engage replaced Recon’s HQ platform in November 2012.

It is also through the Engage mobile app that Recon’s HUDs connect to users’ smartphones unlocking the buddy tracking, music playlist, SMS and caller ID applications, all of which are viewed on the HUD and controlled by the wireless remote.

Software Development Kit (SDK)

At Google I/O 2012, Recon Instruments announced the launch of their Software Development Kit (SDK) that enables software developers, for the first time, to build apps that can be downloaded to Recon's HUDs, designed to personalize the user's experience. By unveiling the Recon Instruments HUD SDK for Android, software developers have been granted access to optimize the Android operating system on which Recon’s latest Heads-up Display technology is built.

The HUD SDK allows app developers to capitalize on the sensory data recorded and relayed by the HUD. This includes readings from the HUDs on-board altimeter, barometer, 3-axis accelerometer, 3-axis gyro, 3-axis magnetometer, and temperature sensor. Additionally, Bluetooth Smart Ready and GPS provide multiple sources of data and tools for developers to create apps, downloadable to Recon’s HUDs.

Awards

External links

• Oakley
• Smith Optics
• Scott Sports
• Uvex
• Alpina
• Briko
• Zeal Optics

See also

• 4iiii - a compact audio/visual heads-up performance coach
• Denno Coil - science fiction depicting similar AR glasses
• EyeTap - eye-mounted camera and HUD
• Google Goggles – query-by-image search engine
• Golden-i - HMD computer
• Instabeat - HUD for swimming
• Laster Technologies – augmented reality devices manufacturer
• Project Glass - AR head-mounted display project by Google
• SixthSense - wearable AR device
• Vuzix - Augmented Reality Smart Glasses