HELLO FUTURE: Digital Twins, VR & 3D Mapping: How Esri Is Powering Smarter Decisions From Space to Elections

Speaker 1 (00:07):
All right, So didn't you hear we're going back to
the moon. America is going back to the moon. And
it takes a lot of people, a lot of nerds
to be candid with you, to get us back to
the moon. It takes a lot of mapping, takes a
lot of virtual realities. It's not just like you're flying
a jet hopefully trying to land it on up there
in the moon. I don't even know remember map quest.
You don't have a map quest to get to the moon.
Hello Future, it's me keV. This is a dispatch from
the Digital Frontier. The planet is Earth, might be the
Moon one day. The year is twenty twenty six, and
the guest today is someone who is at the forefront
of all of these things in terms of digital twins
and virtual reality and three D mapping. She's got one
of those jobs that you know is really important and
kind of sounds like she's living in the matrix and
also on planet Earth, but you don't really know what
she does, so why not have her on the program.
Tajia Fabriccius is a product manager for three D and
virtual reality programming at S three, and she's going to
tell us all about one what they do over there,
and two, how she's helping us land on the moon. Tasia,
Great to have you on. Thanks for showing up to
meet the future. Okay, so first things first, I want
us to get back to the Moon. I personally want
to go to space and maybe even live on Mars.
I don't see it as a death sentence. I see
it as a life sentence, someone told to me the
other day. But in order to do that, we need
people like you helping us navigate. So what is it
number one that you actually do and how is that
going to help us get on the moon?

Speaker 2 (01:55):
Great questions. Thanks a lot for having me, Kevin, I
really appreciate it. So I work for a company called Ezri,
and what we essentially do is we help people to
understand the world through location. So we build software that
turns this sort of complex information that we have because
we've got sensors everywhere, and we have so much data
that we collect on this planet and you know, also
on the Moon and on other planets as well. And
what we do is we're able to use our software
to turn this information into maps and into visual experiences.
So instead of just staring at these sort of you know,
spreadsheets or other data sources that don't really make a
lot of sense. People can actually see what's happening and
where it's happening. We've got governments, businesses, researchers, everyone basically
around the world that's using our technology to help to
make better decisions about cities, transportation, climate risks, emergencies, infrastructure,
all those things.

Speaker 1 (02:54):
So I like to think that I was born a futurist,
but my parents would tell you that I definitely was not.
Let's just say it was probably born a Luddite, not
really good with the technology. But I really became enamored
by VR headsets and being able and storytelling and virtual reality,
and that really did kind of lead me down a
path of curiosity and wanting to understand the future because
I was seeing the virtual worlds and you know, real
life not blur together, but just being able to go
in and out of not just screens anymore, but now
new worlds. And so it led me to go to
this conference, and actually Kara Swisher was at the conference.
I remember there was this VR headset. This was before
the Apple had launched the Vision Pro. There was this
VR company there that allowed for a demo where you
would put on the VR headset and you would see
like this virtual world, this virtual VR three D world
of a wildfire's impact on a city. And when I
was really excited because when I knew that we were
going to get to do this interview and I was
looking at some of the clients that EZRI has, it's yes,
you would like you would expect the governments, a military,
but also businesses. And we're going to talk about Hollywood
later on. But everyone who listens to this nose I'm
obsessed with space and space exploration but also cities, and
you know we I'm living in a city right now
where I'm like, did they use a VR thing for
how to plow the roads? No? Should they have? Yes?
Because now we just are all de late for our interviews,
like I was with Desia because the roads are so icy.
Maybe if they had a VR mapping I would have
been on time. So I'm gonna blame VR for that
glitch and the matrix, But is that really what you
do is you allow for modeling and VR and three
D for and leveraging AI for experts to make more
informed decisions because they can literally not just see the future,
but see simulations of the future and different scenarios.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
Ye, yes, exactly. I mean what you're sort of describing
is is this concept of a digital twin, right, where
you have a digital replica of something, right, whether that
be a city or or some sort of system. So
you're touching on that a very important point they were
where Yeah, the whole idea of VR and digital twins
and all those sort of simulations, it's not a game
thing anymore, right, Like it it is like encroaching really
quickly into into our real lives. You mentioned wildfire or
fire impacts perform. Like We've got a customer, County of Kawai,
and they essentially, you know, there was a devastating wildfire
on Maui.

Speaker 1 (05:42):
Devastating, I mean the destruction, the destruction, and Americans are
becoming all too familiar with wildfires. It's horrible. So how
how would sue help in a situation like that?

Speaker 2 (05:55):
So we we then have the tools for the County
of Kawai, like in this case, to then you know,
they realized, Okay, we need emergency planning, we need zoning
rules that need to change. But then in a lot
of cases, those sort of changes can be hard for
residents to understand and then also support. So what the
County of Kawaii is doing is essentially they're using EXA
to help people to see what the future risks can
look like and why these new rules are necessary.

Speaker 1 (06:24):
So I'm gonna zoom out for a second. I've got
a bunch of bunch of follow up questions for you.
But the reason I love this is I just had
what I like to describe as a meet the future
moment where in the past, folks would show up to
their county local government meetings. I mean, and it is
like watch and pain dry. Let's be honest, and you know,
what they're talking about is super important. But if someone
shows me a simulation in like thirty seconds, even fifteen
seconds of this is what will happen if you do this.
This is what will happen if you don't. Here's the
destruction of the wildfire if we do this. Here's the
destruction if we don't. Here's the path of an emergency
evacuation in a hurricane if you do this. Here's the
path of emergency evacuation in a hurricane if you do that.
And by the way, here's the city. And we humans
are sort of understanding of that, right, because every time
there's a hurricane, for example, and you see it. Oh,
I don't want to get political. That's my old life.
Whether you call it the Golf of Mexico or the
Gulf of America, God bless you. But you see the
Doppler thing in the golf, right, and we see the trajectory.
Essentially that's a forecast, right, that's a forecast. Now we're
taking it. ASU's taking it companies, like as you're taking
it to the next level with simulations and digital twins.
So very simply, we talked about this before we got
on air. What is the difference between a simulation and
a digital twin because I was incorrectly using them interchangeably,
and they're not the same thing.

Speaker 2 (07:50):
I mean they're not, you know, one on one the
same things. But I would say they're kind of like
cousins maybe.

Speaker 1 (07:58):
So likes at each other.

Speaker 2 (08:01):
The digital twins of each other exactly. No, So, like
these simulations will happen within the digital twin, right, So
as you said, like to sort of visualize what is
option A if we do this, and what is what
is option be if we don't.

Speaker 1 (08:14):
So a simulation happens within a digital twin. I don't
understand that. So define for me a digital twin and
try to use an example of the moon to bring
it back to the mood.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
Okay, I was gonna when you said example, I thought
I've got one. So, for example, there's a again a
customer of ours they called Port Coast that's sort of
running the Vietnam ports. And so Vietnam is getting really busy,
really fast, so the country needs to expand without making
these expensive mistakes when it comes to shipping and ports.
So they're basically, you know, they're at their limits now.
And so instead of guessing, these planners are now using
a digital replica of their ports that lets them see
what changes might look like before they even start building
anything in the real world. So they can test things
like a new dock or new shipping routes, or even
like repairs after accidents, like in a virtual environment first.
And so that's what a digital twin is. You're creating
this virtual environment from all this information that you have
within software and then running these simulations within them.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
So put very simply a digital twin. And let's just
use the greatest city in the history of civilization, Philadelphia,
you know, I grow up outside of it. So Philly
is gonna build a new bridge. A digital twin would
be Philly with the bridge. Another digital twin would be
Philly without the bridge, and then a simulation would be
traffic patterns in digital twin Philly with the bridge, and
digital twin simulation in the twin without the bridge. Did
I get it?

Speaker 2 (09:58):
Yeah, you got it? Or even it could be a
twin of Philly with a tunnel. We can also create
a digital twin of the Moon, right because we have
been there before. There is data on the moon.

Speaker 1 (10:08):
So but do we have all the data of the moon, Like,
how much do we actually know about the moon? Because
I hear you know, the dark side of the moon.
It's so dark, there's no light, there's no sound. The
Chinese are there, the committ is party Chinese there, you know,
and I get freaked out by it. But do we
actually have all the data of the moon?

Speaker 2 (10:26):
I mean, good, good question. I mean I think we
have a lot of data on the moon. By now.
There is three D models of the moon, so there
is there's definitely some data out there. We have an
example where we are using real, real data with our
tools as well where we visualize the moon and then
you've kind of got the It was the location of
the rovers, so we could visualize those and it really
helped for if you were just interested like yourself, like
what does it like to go to the moon? You
can go there, you can look where the rovers are,
you can you can sort of look what they're doing.
So I think we have a lot of data on
the Moon.

Speaker 1 (11:01):
I think it's really cool. Though, So how would AS
three technology be deployed for helping us with Artemis and
getting to the moon. How would how would astronauts and
NASA and Space Force and all of the space industry
be deploying your usage.

Speaker 2 (11:16):
So for example, NASA, who obviously are the ones that
are going to the Moon, they would create different applications
based on their use cases and to create these digital
twins that they need in order to do their predictions
and calculations and things like that. So that is that
is how that how our software works within an organization,
Like we're we're the software creators right Like I'm not
sitting here planning Thank god for everyone involved that I'm
not sitting here planning how people are going to get
to the Moon. I'll leave that to the professionals, but
we create the software that enables these professionals to do that.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
You also do stuff with elections, which I find really interesting,
and because when I was prepping for the interview, like
I wouldn't necessarily think of three D or digital twins
as it relates to elections or understanding it. What do
you what's your piece of the puzzle for that.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
What it is is a mapping problem. It's something that
requires mapping in order to understand the data. So I
mean with anything, elections being an example. Obviously you've got
people voting, you've got different demographics, and so ideally also
have a way to represent that.

Speaker 1 (12:28):
So it's fascinating. Everything's becoming a simulation within a digital twin.
And so, folks, my big meat the future moment today
was really understanding that that it's not just living in
an Excel spreadsheet anymore. It's taking the data and bringing
it to life. It's technology that's being deployed from outer
space to Hollywood, to our elections, to the Hawaii wildfires. Fascinating.
Tajub Richies, astor product manager, thanks for showing up to
meet the future.

Speaker 2 (12:59):
Thanks Kevin