HTX Labs Adapts Its VR Platform for the Air Force Pilot Training Next Initiative

August 2, 2019

William Kucinski

Houston-based HTX Labs, LLC was awarded with Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II funding to continue adapting its EMPACT Virtual Reality (VR) platform for the United States Air Force ’s Pilot Training Next program. The U.S. Air Force intends to use EMPACT to fast-track the creation of highly immersive VR simulations to accelerate pilot training.

Image courtesy: HTX Labs, LLC via YouTube

The planned adaptation of EMPACT, which builds on SBIR Phase I work for the U.S. Air Force, will allow military personnel to rapidly create immersive training environments and then systematically and objectively establish efficacy of VR-enabled training simulations – a technology that will allow benchmarking and time-lapse views of the student's progress and physical mastery of a prescribed set of protocols and procedures.

William Kucinski is content editor at SAE International, Aerospace Products Group in Warrendale, Pa. Previously, he worked as a writer at the NASA Safety Center in Cleveland, Ohio and was responsible for writing the agency’s System Failure Case Studies. His interests include literally anything that has to do with space, past and present military aircraft, and propulsion technology.

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